Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary
Isaiah 53:5

Clarke's Commentary

Verse Isaiah 53:5. The chastisement of our peace - "The chastisement by which our peace is effected"] Twenty-one MSS. and six editions have the word fully and regularly expressed, שלמינו shelomeynu; pacificationum nostrarum, "our pacification;" that by which we are brought into a state of peace and favour with God. Ar. Montan.

Bridgeway Bible Commentary

The servant’s suffering and glory (52:13-53:12)

Just as people were startled at the sight of the servant’s great sufferings, so will they be startled at the sight of his great glory. They will be struck dumb, as it were, as they witness a sight more glorious than they or anyone else could ever have imagined (13-15).
Many people find it hard to believe that God will give his servant such power and magnificence, because when they look at the servant they see just an ordinary person of insignificant beginnings. They liken him to a small plant growing in dry and infertile ground - so different from the magnificent trees that stand majestically in the tall forests. They see nothing in his appearance that is impressive or attractive. On the contrary, when they see the extent of his sufferings they turn away from him in disgust, like people repelled by the sight of a diseased person (53:1-3).
At first those who see the servant’s intense suffering think that he is being punished by God for some wrong he has done. However, as they think further they realize that he is suffering not for his own sins, but for the sins of others; in fact, their sins. They are the ones who have turned away from God and they are the ones for whom the servant dies. It is for them that he bears God’s punishment (4-6).
The servant is treated cruelly, but he bears it silently. Those who judge him show neither mercy nor justice; they just send him off to be killed. His fellow citizens are just as heartless, and show no concern that he suffers death unjustly. Yet he bears all this for the sake of those who are sinners (7-8). Those who hate him leave him to die in disgrace like a criminal, but those who love him give him an honourable burial. They know he has done no wrong (9).
Despite the inhumanity of people, the servant’s death is according to God’s will. It is a sacrifice for the removal of sin. But beyond the sorrow of death is the joy of the resurrection. The servant is satisfied when he sees the fruits of his suffering, namely, a multitude of spiritual children who are forgiven their sins and accounted righteous before God because of his death (10-11). The sufferer becomes the conqueror and receives a conqueror’s reward. Because he willingly took the place of sinners and prayed for their forgiveness, he is now exalted to the highest place (12).

Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible

THE THIRD STANZA

“Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. 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. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way; and Jehovah hath laid upon him the iniquity of us all.”

This is the heart of the Song of the Servant; here we learn why Jesus suffered, that it was not for himself but for us that he suffered. Note the emphatic recurrence of the word “our,” as in our griefs, our sorrows, our transgressions, our peace, and our healing. “The atoning significance of the suffering is expounded here.”The New Bible Commentary, Revised, p. 618.

Right here is the vital heart of Christianity: The case of Adam’s race was hopeless. All had sinned and fallen short of God’s glory. The penalty of sin is death, and the justice of God required that the penalty be paid; otherwise all of the human race would have been lost forever. But there was no one who could pay it. What was the solution? God Himself stepped into the human race; and, in the person of his Son, paid the penalty himself upon the Cross! Thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift! No wonder that Satan executed every cruelty possible upon Jesus; because without the sacrifice of Jesus in paying the penalty of human transgressions, Satan would have achieved his purpose of the total destruction of Adam’s race.

The words “borne our griefs” in Isaiah 53:4 in the Hebrew are literally “borne our sicknesses”;Wycliffe Old Testament Commentary, p. 647. but this is not a reference to Jesus’ suffering from all our sicknesses, but to his healing all diseases. It was to make this point clear that the translators rendered the word “griefs.” Thus, “The rendition griefs is justifiable.”Ibid.

“We did deem him stricken of God, and afflicted” There is an inadvertent condemnation of the whole human race in this. No tendency among men is any more prevalent than that of attributing all the sorrows on earth to the fault and sins of the suffering people. This unhappy trait of men is often noted in scripture. The parents of the man born blind, asked, “Who sinned this man, or his parents, that he should have been born blind?” (John 9); and the citizens of Malta attributed Paul’s snakebite to the supposed criminality of the apostle (Acts 28:4). This indicates that the terrible and unlawful punishments, even death, that befell Jesus were considered by the people as being the natural result of the sins of Jesus. How wrong and misguided were the people!

“Chastisement” Little did Pilate know, when he ordered the chastisement of Jesus that his command caused the fulfillment of this specific prophecy of the Christ. That the chastisement was indeed for “our sins” and for “our peace” is certain; because the Roman Procurator declared upon the occasion of his command that it was not indeed for anything that Jesus was guilty of; and he declared him innocent on that very occasion!

“Stripes” is another reference to the chastisement; and modern treatment of criminals has no indication whatever of the terrible and sadistic brutality that accompanied such “scourgings.” Excavations of the old judgment seat of Pilate have discovered the very truncated pillar upon which our Lord might have been chained, while two Roman soldiers, standing one on each side, with the brutal whips made lethal and bloody by small pieces of bone or glass chips attached to the cords of the whips, applied the awful punishment, first to the back, and then after turning the victim over, to the chest and face, each soldier smiting the victim with all his strength, and taking time about with their blows, tortured the victim within an inch of his life. No wonder the Lord fainted under the weight of the cross. After that chastisement, Jesus presented such a pitiable spectacle, that Pilate actually thought the Jews would declare that he needed no more punishment; and so he brought Jesus out and presented him to the mob, saying, “Behold the Man”! How pitifully wrong was Pilate’s underestimation of the sadistic hatred of that Jewish mob screaming for his crucifixion!

“Jehovah hath laid on him the iniquity of us all” No greater declaration from Jehovah was ever given than this affirmation that Jesus Christ suffered for the sins of all men. The perfect, sinless life of Jesus was a sacrifice sufficiently adequate to atone for the sins of all mankind.

Note here that the prophecy states that Jehovah laid the sins of all men upon Jesus. This corresponds with Paul’s statement that “God set forth his son to be a propitiation, through faith, in his blood” (Romans 3:25). Thus the initiative lay with God in the sufferings of Jesus upon the Cross. (1) God so loved the world that HE GAVE HIS ONLY BEGOTTEN SON. God was not the only one, however, who had a part in Jesus’ sacrifice upon the Cross. (2) Satan did indeed bruise the heel of the Seed of Woman. (3) Christ himself engineered his death upon Calvary (Luke 9:31). (4) The Jews crucified him. (5) the Romans crucified him. (6) The human race crucified him. (7) Every man crucified him. Were you there when they crucified my Lord? See the extensive discussion of these seven under the question, “Who Crucified Christ?” in Vol. 6 (Romans) of my New Testament Series of Commentaries, pp. 117-122.

Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

But he was wounded - Margin, ‘Tormented.’ Jerome and the Septuagint also render this, ‘He was wounded.’ Junius and Tremellius, ‘He was affected with grief.’ The Chaldee has given a singular paraphrase of it, showing how confused was the view of the whole passage in the mind of that interpreter. ‘And he shall build the house of the sanctuary which was defiled on account of our sins, and which was delivered on account of our iniquities. And in his doctrine, peace shall be multiplied to us. And when we obey his words, our sins shall be remitted to us.’ The Syriac renders it in a remarkable manner, ‘He is slain on account of our sins,’ thus showing that it was a common belief that the Messiah would be violently put to death. The word rendered ‘wounded’ (מחלל mecholâl), is a Pual participle, from חלל châlal, to bore through, to perforate, to pierce; hence, to wound 1Sa 31:3; 1 Chronicles 10:3; Ezekiel 28:9. There is probably the idea of painful piercing, and it refers to some infliction of positive wounds on the body, and not to mere mental sorrows, or to general humiliation. The obvious idea would be that there would be some act of piercing, some penetrating wound that would endanger or take life. Applied to the actual sufferings of the Messiah, it refers undoubtedly to the piercing of his hands, his feet, and his side. The word ‘tormented,’ in the margin, was added by our translators because the Hebrew word might be regarded as derived from חול chûl, to writhe, to be tormented, to be pained - a word not unfrequently applied to the pains of parturition. But it is probable that it is rather to be regarded as derived from חלל châlal, “to pierce, or to wound.”

For our transgressions - The prophet here places himself among the people for whom the Messiah suffered these things, and says that he was not suffering for his own sins, but on account of theirs. The preposition ‘for’ (מן min) here answers to the Greek διά dia, on account of, and denotes the cause for which he suffered and means, even according to Gesenius (Lex.), here, ‘the ground or motive on account of, or because of which anything is done.’ Compare Deuteronomy 7:7; Judges 5:11; Esther 5:9; Psalms 68:30; Song of Solomon 3:8. It is strikingly parallel to the passage in Romans 4:25 : ‘Who was delivered for (διά dia) our offences.’ Compare 2 Corinthians 5:21; Heb 9:28; 1 Peter 2:24. Here the sense is, that the reason why he thus suffered was, that we were transgressors. All along the prophet keeps up the idea that it was not on account of any sin of which he was guilty that he thus suffered, but it was for the sins of others - an idea which is everywhere exhibited in the New Testament.

He was bruised - The word used here (דכא dâkâ') means properly to be broken to pieces, to be bruised, to be crushed Job 6:9; Psalms 72:4. Applied to mind, it means to break down or crush by calamities and trials; and by the use of the word here, no doubt, the most severe inward and outward sufferings are designated. The Septuagint renders it, Μεμαλάκιστα Memalakista - ‘He was rendered languid,’ or feeble. The same idea occurs in the Syriac translation. The meaning is, that he was under such a weight of sorrows on account of our sins, that he was, as it were, crushed to the earth. How true this was of the Lord Jesus it is not necessary here to pause to show.

The chastisement of our peace - That is, the chastisement by which our peace is effected or secured was laid upon him; or, he took it upon himself,’ and bore it, in order that we might have peace. Each word here is exceedingly important, in order to a proper estimate of the nature of the work performed by the Redeemer. The word ‘chastisement’ (מוּסר mûsâr), properly denotes the correction, chastisement, or punishment inflicted by parents on their children, designed to amend their faults Proverbs 22:15; Proverbs 23:13. It is applied also to the discipline and authority of kings Job 22:18; and to the discipline or correction of God Job 5:17; Hosea 5:2. Sometimes it means admonition or instruction, such as parents give to children, or God to human beings. It is well rendered by the Septuagint by Παιδεία Paideia; by Jerome, Disciplina. The word does not of necessity denote punishment, though it is often used in that sense.

It is properly that which corrects, whether it be by admonition, counsel, punishment, or suffering. Here it cannot properly mean punishment - for there is no punishment where there is no guilt, and the Redeemer had done no sin; but it means that he took upon himself the sufferings which would secure the peace of those for whom he died - those which, if they could have been endured by themselves, would have effected their peace with God. The word peace means evidently their peace with God; reconciliation with their Creator. The work of religion in the soul is often represented as peace; and the Redeemer is spoken of as the great agent by whom that is secured. ‘For he is our peace’ (Ephesians 2:14-15, Ephesians 2:17; compare Acts 10:36; Romans 5:1; Romans 10:15). The phrase ‘upon him,’ means that the burden by which the peace of people was effected was laid upon him, and that he bore it. It is parallel with the expressions which speak of his bearing it, carrying it, etc. And the sense of the whole is, that he endured the sorrows, whatever they were, which were needful to secure our peace with God.

And with his stripes - Margin, ‘Bruise.’ The word used here in Hebrew (חבורה chabbûrâh) means properly stripe, weal, bruise, that is, the mark or print of blows on the skin. Greek Μώλωπι Mōlōpi; Vulgate, Livore. On the meaning of the Hebrew word, see the notes at Isaiah 1:6. It occurs in the following places, and is translated by stripe, and stripes (Exodus 21:25, bis); bruises Isaiah 1:6; hurt Genesis 4:23; blueness Proverbs 20:30; wounds Psalms 38:5; and spots, as of a leopard Jeremiah 13:23. The proper idea is the weal or wound made by bruising; the mark designated by us when we speak of its being ‘black and blue.’ It is not a flesh wound; it does not draw blood; but the blood and other humors are collected under the skin. The obvious and natural idea conveyed by the word here is, that the individual referred to would be subjected to some treatment that would cause such a weal or stripe; that is, that he would be beaten, or scourged. How literally this was applicable to the Lord Jesus, it is unnecessary to attempt to prove (see Matthew 27:26). It may be remarked here, that this could not be mere conjecture How could Isaiah, seven hundred years before it occurred, conjecture that the Messiah would be scourged and bruised? It is this particularity of prediction, compared with the literal fulfillment, which furnishes the fullest demonstration that the prophet was inspired. In the prediction nothing is vague and general. All is particular and minute, as if he saw what was done, and the description is as minutely accurate as if he was describing what was actually occurring before his eyes.

We are healed - literally, it is healed to us; or healing has happened to us. The healing here referred to, is spiritual healing, or healing from sin. Pardon of sin, and restoration to the favor of God, are not unfrequently represented as an act of healing. The figure is derived from the fact that awakened and convicted sinners are often represented as crushed, broken, bruised by the weight of their transgressions, and the removal of the load of sin is repesented as an act of healing. ‘I said, O Lord, be merciful unto me; heal my soul, for I have sinned againt thee’ Psalms 41:4. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am weak; O Lord, heal me, for my bones are vexed’ Psalms 6:2. ‘Who forgiveth all thine, iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases Psalms 103:3. The idea here is, that the Messiah would be scourged; and that it would be by that scourging that health would be imparted to our souls.

It would be in our place, and in our stead; and it would be designed to have the same effect in recovering us, as though it had been inflicted on ourselves. And will it not do it? Is it not a fact that it has such an effect? Is not a man as likely to be recovered from a course of sin and folly, who sees another suffer in his place what he ought himself to suffer, as though he was punished himself? Is not a wayward and dissipated son quite as likely to be recovered to a course of virtue by seeing the sufferings which his career of vice causes to a father, a mother, or a sister, as though he himself When subjected to severe punishment? When such a son sees that he is bringing down the gray hairs of his father with sorrow to the grave; when he sees that he is breaking the heart of the mother that bore him; when he sees a sister bathed in tears, or in danger of being reduced to poverty or shame by his course, it will be far more likely to reclaim him than would be personal suffering, or the prospect of poverty, want, and an early death. And it is on this principle that the plan of salvation is founded. We shall be more certainly reclaimed by the voluntary sufferings of the innocent in our behalf, than we should be by being personally punished. Punishment would make no atonement, and would bring back no sinner to God. But the suffering of the Redeemer in behalf of mankind is adapted to save the world, and will in fact arrest, reclaim, and redeem all who shall ever enter into heaven.

(Sin is not only a crime for which we were condemned to die, and which Christ purchased for us the pardon of, but it is a disease which tends directly to the death of our souls, and which Christ provided for the cure of. By his stripes, that is, the sufferings he underwent, he purchased for us the Spirit and grace of God, to mortify our corruptions, which are the distempers of our souls; and to put our souls in a good state of health, that they may be fit to serve God, and prepare to enjoy him. And by the doctrine of Christ’s cross, and the powerful arguments it furnisheth us with against sin, the dominion of sin is broken in us, anal we are fortified against that which feeds the disease - Henry.)

Calvin's Commentary on the Bible

5.And he was wounded for our iniquities. He again repeats the cause of Christ’s great afflictions, in order to meet the scandal which might have arisen from it. The spectacle of the cross alienates many persons from Christ, when they consider what is presented to their eyes, and do not observe the object to be accomplished. But all offense is removed when we know that by his death our sins have been expiated, and salvation has been obtained for us.

The chastisement of our peace. Some think that this is called “the chastisement of peace,” on account of men being careless and stupefied amidst their afflictions, and therefore that it was necessary that Christ should suffer. Others view “peace” as relating to the consciences, that is, that Christ suffered, in order that we might have peaceful consciences; as Paul says that, “being justified by faith through Christ, we have peace with God.” (Romans 5:1) But I take it to denote simply reconciliation. Christ was the price of “our chastisement,” that is, of the chastisement which was due to us. Thus the wrath of God, which had been justly kindled against us, was appeased; and through the Mediator we have obtained “peace,” by which we are reconciled.

We ought to draw from this a universal doctrine, namely, that we are reconciled to God by free grace, because Christ hath paid the price of “our peace.” This is indeed acknowledged by the Papists; but then they limit this doctrine to original sin, as if after baptism there were no longer any room for reconciliation through free grace, but that we must give satisfaction by our merits and works. But the Prophet does not here treat of a single species of pardon, but extends this blessing to the whole course of life; and therefore it cannot be thus undervalued or limited to a particular time, without most heinous sacrilege. Hence also the frivolous distinction of the Papists, between the remission of punishment and the pardon of sin, is easily refuted. They affirm that punishment is not remitted to us, unless it be washed out by satisfactions. But the Prophet openly declares that the punishment of our sins was transferred to him. What, then, do the Papists intend but to be Christ’s equals and companions, and to lay claim to share with him in his authority?

In his wound (or, in his medicine) we have healing. He again directs us to Christ, that we may betake ourselves to his wounds, provided that we wish to regain life. Here the Prophet draws a contrast between us and Christ; for in us nothing call be found but destruction and death; in Christ alone is life and salvation, he alone brought medicine to us, and even procures health by his weakness, and life by his death; for he alone hath pacified the Father, he alone hath reconciled us to him. Here we might bring forward many things about the blessed consequences of Christ’s sufferings, if we had not determined to expound rather than to preach; and therefore let us be satisfied with a plain exposition. Let every one, therefore, draw consolation from this passage, and let him apply the blessed result of this doctrine to his own use; for these words are spoken to all in general, and to individuals in particular.

Smith's Bible Commentary

By Chuck Smith

When men made chapter and verse divisions, they did make mistakes. The Word of God is divinely inspired; it's inerrant. But men, for the sake of helping us to find scriptures and to memorize passages, divided the Bible into chapter and verses. And it's a very convenient way to reference. However, many times they made the divisions in the wrong place, and in our reading we are prone to read to an end of a chapter and then quit until the next reading. And sometimes the thought carries right through, so that in the dividing of the chapters, they should have ended chapter 52 with verse Isaiah 53:12 . And they should have started chapter 53 with verse Isaiah 52:13 , because the last three verses here definitely fit in with Isaiah 53:1-12 . And so that we might see the relationship with 53, we will begin our study of chapter 53 with verse Isaiah 52:13 of 52.

As God now speaks about His servant, His only begotten Son, "who was in the form of God, and thought it not something to be grasped to be equal with God: and yet He humbled Himself and took on the likeness of man or the form of man and came in likeness of man. And being humbled, He came as a servant" ( Philippians 2:6-8 ). And so Jesus said, "I came not to do My own will but the will of the One who sent Me" ( John 6:38 ). And in the garden He said, "Not My will, Thy will be done" ( Luke 22:42 ), as He submitted as a servant unto the Father.

Now Isaiah begins to prophesy here concerning God's servant that was to come.

Behold, my servant shall deal prudently, he shall be exalted and extolled ( Isaiah 52:13 ),

The Hebrew word extolled is the word lifted up. It is the very same word that Jesus used in the New Testament when talking to His disciples said, "And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me" ( John 12:32 ). Now Jesus when He was referring to being lifted up was referring to the death that He was to die upon the cross, as He would be lifted up upon a cross. "And I, if I be lifted up." And the idea is being lifted up on a cross, I will draw all men unto Me. Now that scripture has been carelessly interpreted by many people as just lifting up Jesus. If you'll just lift up Jesus, He'll draw all men to Him, you see. So in your ministry, just lift up Jesus, and they even have choruses, "Let's lift Him higher, let's lift Him higher. That all the world may see." Well, whoever wrote that chorus doesn't have a real understanding of scripture, because they have taken it out of its context. In the context, the gospel writer said, "This said He signifying the manner of death that He was going to die" ( John 12:33 ). That is, signifying the cross, lifted up on a cross.

And so here the cross is predicted, prophesied in Isaiah. "He shall be exalted and lifted up, and be very high."

As many were astonished at thee; his visage [or face] was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men ( Isaiah 52:14 ):

In the Hebrew this reads more literally, "His face was so marred that He could not be recognized as a man or as a human being."

Now we are told in the gospel that they covered His face and they began to buffet Him. That is, with His face covered they began to hit Him. Now as a general rule our bodies have an automatic reflex kind of an action, when we see a blow coming we give with the blow so it cushions the blow. You don't get the full brunt of it. If you don't cushion the blow, a surprise blow that you don't see coming, that's where you get hurt. You guys that watch the Monday night football, you know that. When a quarterback gets blindsided, he's in trouble. If he can see the guy coming, you just sort of, you reflex action to it and you sort of go with it. And you may get bounced all over, but you're reacting and coordinating with it and thus it's a lot easier to take. But if you don't see that big tackle barreling in on you, and he hits you without your having any ability to defend yourself by the feigning that a person does, that's when you get the broken bones. And that's when you get laid out of the game. Those blindsides are the really thing that will put you out.

Now with Jesus as they covered His face and began to buffet Him, no way to feign or to give with the blow, and thus His face must have been horribly disfigured. Here Isaiah declares that it was so shocking. "As many as looked upon you was shocked when they saw how marred your face was. So marred that you could not be recognized as a man, as a human being."

So shall he sprinkle many nations; the kings shall shut their mouths at him: for that which had not been told them they shall see; and that which they had not heard shall they consider. But who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed? For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: now he has no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him ( Isaiah 52:15 , Isaiah 53:1-2 ).

Interesting prophecies concerning Jesus Christ. He has no beautiful form or comeliness. There is no beauty there that we should desire. In other words, we'll not be attracted to Him by the physical beauty. So often we have in our minds sort of a mental picture of what a person may look like. And we sort of automatically do this even though we haven't seen a person.

I get this all the time where I go into areas where people have been listening on the radio. And I'll go into an area to speak and all they've heard is my voice. And it is interesting to watch their shocked expressions when they see me. Because they have envisioned usually something far different than what I look like. But somehow we always create sort of a mental image. It's an ambiguous kind of an image, but yet there is sort of a mental image of what the person must look like who has a voice like that. And it so often is very shocking when you see the person that you've been listening to. I was shocked when I first met Dr. McGee and I didn't think he would look like that at all with that southern voice. I expected to see some tall, Texan type of a guy, and it was just a surprise to me. And I suppose he was just as surprised to see me and to see what I look like.

So we have in our mind sort of a mental image of what Jesus is going to look like and we sort of imagine just being enthralled with the physical beauty of Christ. But as many as looked upon Him were astonished because really, there is no form or comeliness that is really attractive when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. It isn't for the beautiful form that we will be attracted. And I think that this is, I think that this is rather great that it will not be the beautiful form that we're attracted to. Because face it, the majority of the people are ugly. Very few beautiful people, really beautiful people. Most of us are in the category of we can get by. But it isn't our looks that really attract people.

Now if He were one of those beautiful persons, then it would be more difficult for us to identify with Him. But the fact that it isn't the beauty of His form that is attractive or draws us to Him means that each of us can identify with Him, because it is that spiritual beauty and the love that just draws us so much that we care not what the form may look like.

Now when John was in heaven and he saw the scroll in the right hand of Him who sits upon the throne, and he heard the angel proclaim with a loud voice, "Who is worthy to take the scroll and loose the seals?" And as he observed that no one was found worthy in heaven and earth to take the scroll or to loose the seals, he began to weep. And one of the elders said unto John, "Don't weep, John. Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah hath prevailed to take the scroll and to loose the seals." And John said, "And I turned and I saw Him as a lamb that hath been slaughtered" ( Revelation 5:2-6 ). No beauty that we should desire Him.

John's first glimpse of Christ in heaven, he saw Him as a lamb that had been slaughtered. Not as some tremendously physical, robust, handsome creature that we all sort of envision Jesus to be. But perhaps the Lord still bears the marks of His suffering for you. He did bear those marks after the resurrection. For you remember Thomas said, "Except I can put my fingers into His hand and thrust my hand into His side, I won't believe" ( John 20:25 ). And so the next time Jesus showed Himself to the disciples, Thomas being present, He said, "Okay, Thomas, go ahead. Put your finger in My hand. Put your hand in My side." The marks were still there. It said, "And they shall look on Him whom they have pierced" ( Zechariah 12:10 ). And they shall say unto Him, "What are the meaning of these wounds in Your hands?" Yet future, still bearing them; the marks of His love for you.

So as many as saw Him were astonished. "He has no form nor comeliness." That is, really an attractive, desirable or attracting feature. "When we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him."

He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief ( Isaiah 53:3 ):

Now you probably have in your mind mental pictures of what Paul must have looked like. I read the epistles of Paul and I think of him as a giant. Surely he's a spiritual giant. I read in one of the apocrypha books, one of the early writings, a description of Paul the apostle. And it describes him as a skinny little runt about five feet tall with a horribly large hooked nose and eyes that were red, swollen and constantly running, and it gave this horrible... And I was upset because that's not how I pictured Paul at all. I'm in love with Paul. My, what this man has given to us of his great depth of understanding and background. And I so love the writings of Paul that I've been drawn to him. He is one of those that I'm looking forward to just really spending some time with in the future. And yet, without seeing the physical person, it is possible to be in love with an individual and yet not be physically attracted. And yet, it is interesting how so often today we only associate love with physical attraction, and not with the person themselves. And that's rather tragic. And that's why so many marriages are miserable, because the person has married the face but there's nothing behind the face. There's no depth of character. There's just the face and that's it.

One of the most miserable dates I ever had in my life was with a girl with a pretty face. Oh, I was excited. I thought, "Man alive, this is going to be great!" My sister worked with her sister, and as they talked... "My brother," "Oh, my sister... " "Well, my sister thinks your brother is cute," or something. And that's all I needed. So you call up and you make a date. Most miserable night. She had a beautiful face, but man, she was a dud. I mean, just a dull evening. No conversation, nothing. And people make mistakes many times in relationships because we relate on the physical, rather than upon the true nature of a person.

Now, "He is despised and rejected of men; He is a man of sorrows, He's acquainted with grief."

and we hid as it were our faces from him ( Isaiah 53:3 );

Perhaps in shock and in horror. Have you ever looked at something that was so shocking you couldn't look; you turned your face? You couldn't stand to look at it. It was so horrible. It may be that that will be your first response when you see the marks of the suffering that He bore for you. You look and you can't even... He doesn't even look like a human being. You just sort of cringe at it.

he was despised ( Isaiah 53:3 ),

He's rejected.

and we didn't esteem him ( Isaiah 53:3 ).

But surely in that suffering, in that death,

He bore our griefs, and he carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions ( Isaiah 53:4-5 ),

Now this is why it is so ridiculous to try to hold the Jews responsible for the death of Jesus Christ and to blame them and to persecute them as has been the history of the church; persecute them for the death of Jesus Christ. That's sheer unscriptural idiocy. They are no more responsible for the death of Jesus Christ than you or I. We are all equally responsible for His death. For He was wounded for our transgressions. It was my sin that put Him on the cross. It was my sin that brought Him that suffering and that beating and that shame and that reproach. I'm guilty! And we shouldn't seek to blame someone else for our own guilt and to persecute someone else for that for which we are ourselves responsible. Surely He hath borne our griefs, carried our sorrows. 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 ).

So we are the ones responsible for the suffering and the death of Jesus Christ, because He suffered and died for me that He might bring me the forgiveness of my sins. That He might bring me into fellowship with God. You see, God created man in the beginning for fellowship. That was the purpose of God when He created man-that God might be able to fellowship with man. But when man turned his back upon God and sinned, fellowship with God was broken. And fellowship with God who is holy and righteous cannot be restored until something is done about my sin. And that is why Jesus came that He might take the guilt of my sin. That He might bear my iniquities, my transgressions, my guilt, die in my place in order that through His death I can now come to God and have fellowship with God.

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on Jesus Christ the iniquities of us all ( Isaiah 53:6 ).

You remember Jesus cried on the cross, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" Crying out the twenty-second psalm, and in the verse Isaiah 53:3 the answer is given, "For Thou art holy, O Thou that inhabitest the praises of Thy people." God forsook His Son when your sin was placed upon Him. For that's the effect of sin. It's being forsaken of God. Being separated from God. And when your sin was placed upon Jesus Christ, He was separated from the Father. And thus the cry, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" But He was forsaken of God in order that you won't have to be forsaken by God. "For God laid on Him the iniquities of us all."

He was oppressed, he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth ( Isaiah 53:7 ):

You remember before Pilate, Pilate marvelled that He didn't answer. He said, "Answerest Thou not me? Don't You know that I have power to free Thee, the power to put Thee to death?" Jesus said, "You don't have any power except that which My Father gives you. But don't worry, those that turned Me over to you have the greater sin than you do. I know you're troubled, Pilate." He didn't know what he had on his hands and he did his best to free Him. But, "He opened not His mouth."

he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth ( Isaiah 53:7 ).

All of the accusations. "Hear not all these things they accuse Thee of? What do You say for Yourself?" Jesus didn't answer.

He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off ( Isaiah 53:8 )

You see, without any children, who's going to declare His generation?

He was cut off out of the land of the living ( Isaiah 53:8 ):

Now that's an interesting phrase, "Cut off out of the land of the living." You remember that Daniel prophesies, "From the time the commandment goes forth to restore and rebuild Jerusalem to the coming of the Messiah the Prince will be seven sevens and sixty-two sevens, three score and two sevens. And the wall shall be built again in troublous times, and after the three score and two sevens shall the Messiah be cut off. But not for Himself, but for the people" ( Daniel 9:25-26 ). For He's cut off. He'll be crucified. Out of the land of the living. And God cries out,

for the transgression of my people was he stricken. And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death ( Isaiah 53:8-9 );

You remember Joseph of Arimathaea, a very rich man, came and begged Pilate for the body of Jesus that he might bury it. And here it is. He's with the rich in His death.

because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when he shall make his soul an offering for sin ( Isaiah 53:9-10 ),

So Christ became the sin offering for us. According to the will of God because God loved us.

he shall see his seed, and prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. He shall see the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied ( Isaiah 53:10-11 ):

That is, He travailed in order that you might be born again. And in seeing your redemption, in seeing you in fellowship with God, He's satisfied. He looks upon Him and says it was worth it all because of the redemption that He is able to offer to us. That fellowship that He can bring to us with the Father. And so, "He shall see the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied."

and by his knowledge ( Isaiah 53:11 )

That is, by the knowledge of Jesus Christ.

my righteous servant shall justify many ( Isaiah 53:11 );

So how many of us tonight have been justified before God through the knowledge of Jesus Christ? So God declares, "By his knowledge shall My righteous servant justify many."

for he shall bear their iniquities ( Isaiah 53:11 ).

Now all of this written 700 years before Christ was born. That is why when Peter stood up on the day of Pentecost and talked to the people who were involved in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, he said unto them, "Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was proved to be of God by the signs and the wonders which He did while He was still living with you, whom you according to the predeterminate counsel and foreknowledge of God with your wicked hands have crucified and slain" ( Acts 2:22-23 ). But when he talks about the crucifixion, he speaks about the predetermined counsel and the foreknowledge of God. God knew it. God had planned it in order that He might demonstrate to you how much He loves you. "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that God loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins" ( 1 John 4:10 ). Paul said, "For a righteous man some might dare to die: for a good man peradventure some would even give their lives. But herein is God's love manifested, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly" ( Romans 5:7-8 ). He bore your iniquities. He bore your sins.

Therefore [the Father says] will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong ( Isaiah 53:12 );

"Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and if sons, then heirs, joint-heirs with Jesus Christ" ( Romans 8:16-17 ), as He divides the spoil with the strong.

because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors ( Isaiah 53:12 );

Two thieves on either, one on either side. "He was numbered with the transgressors."

and he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors ( Isaiah 53:11 ).

You remember even as they were nailing Him, He said, "Father, forgive them; they know not what they do" ( Luke 23:34 ). Interceding for the transgressors. All of these things prophesied in advance. All of them fulfilled through the death of Jesus Christ. Surely it sets Him alone in history as the only man who could ever qualify to be the Messiah, the suffering servant. If Jesus is not the Messiah, there is no Messiah. No other man can qualify. But Jesus has qualified in all 300 points of prophecy that spoke about His life, His ministry, His death. And here in Isaiah, outstanding example of clear-cut prophecy. And if it doesn't refer to Jesus Christ, it can't refer to any other person in history. He stands alone as the only One who has fulfilled these things. And to reject Him after the basis of this kind of evidence is to sin against your own conscience and to sin against the truth, which becomes even a greater evil. "

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

The Servant wounded 53:4-6

It becomes clear in this stanza of the song that the Servant’s sufferings were not His own fault, as onlookers thought. They were for the sins of humankind and resulted in our healing. Furthermore, He would not merely suffer because of the sins of the people, because He was one of them. He would suffer in their place. The substitute nature of His sufferings is clear in the descriptions Isaiah presented, in the context of the arm of the Lord references, and in view of the nature of sin. Since sin is against a holy God it does not just require physical suffering, which Israel had experienced in abundance, but spiritual suffering: separation from God. Animal sacrifices covered human sin only temporarily, but a perfect sinless human sacrifice was necessary to remove the sin of humanity (cf. Hebrews 9:13-14).

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

"But" continues the contrast between the Servant and the rest of humankind. He would not only experience affliction for us but injury as well. "Pierced through" and "crushed" describe extreme distress resulting in death (cf. Isaiah 51:9; Job 26:13; Psalms 109:22; Lamentations 3:34). The Hebrew words behind these terms are the strongest ones in that language for violent and excruciating death. [Note: Delitzsch, 2:318.] Transgressions are willful and rebellious sins, and iniquities are sins that result from the perverted quality of human nature due to the continuing effects of the Fall.

"Thus, Isaiah 53:4 demands the noun ’substitution’, and Isaiah 53:5 adds the adjective ’penal’." [Note: Motyer, p. 430.]

Looking back from the Cross, we can see how appropriate these terms were in view of the death Jesus died, death by crucifixion. It was God who was behind the piercing and crushing of the Servant (Isaiah 53:6; Isaiah 53:10). It was as though the Servant took the whipping that we deserved for being rebellious children (cf. Romans 4:25; 1 Corinthians 15:3; Hebrews 5:8; Hebrews 9:28; 1 Peter 2:24-25).

"This is not a matter of a raging tyrant who demands violence on someone to satisfy his fury. It is a God who wants a whole relationship with his people, but is prevented from having it until incomplete justice is satisfied." [Note: Oswalt, The Book . . . 40-66, p. 388.]

"What else, we ask again, can these words mean than that He suffered vicariously? Not merely with, but for others? By no exegesis is it possible to escape this conclusion." [Note: Baron, p. 89.]

What the Servant would do in bearing the consequences of humankind’s sins would bring about positive results for many people. This shows again that the Servant’s sufferings were not just with His people but for them. He would bear away sins so people could experience healing and well-being (Heb. shalom, the fullness of God’s blessing). This is far more than just physical healing; the whole passage is dealing with redemption from sin. [Note: See Bruce R. Reichenback, "’By His Stripes We Are Healed,’" Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 41:4 (December 1998):551-60, for a helpful study of how the Old Testament views the linkage between sin, sickness, suffering, and death, contrasted with modern views.]

But does it include physical healing? Is there healing in the atonement? Does what the Servant did guarantee physical healing for every believer? Ultimately it does. Eventually we will experience good health since poor health is one effect of sin. But immediately it does not in every case. We have yet to enter into all the benefits of Christ’s death for us, and must continue to struggle with some of the consequences of the Fall until we see the Lord. [Note: See Baron, p. 86.]

Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

But he was wounded for our transgressions,.... Not for any sins of his own, but for ours, for our rebellions against God, and transgressions of his law, in order to make atonement and satisfaction for them; these were the procuring and meritorious causes of his sufferings and death, as they were taken upon him by him to answer for them to divine justice, which are meant by his being wounded; for not merely the wounds he received in his hands, feet, and side, made by the nails and spear, are meant, but the whole of his sufferings, and especially his being wounded to death, and which was occasionally by bearing the sins of his people; and hereby he removed the guilt from them, and freed them from the punishment due unto them:

he was bruised for our iniquities; as bread corn is bruised by threshing it, or by its being ground in the mill, as the manna was; or as spice is bruised in a mortar, he being broken and crushed to pieces under the weight of sin, and the punishment of it. The ancient Jews understood this of the Messiah; in one place they say o,

"chastisements are divided into three parts, one to David and the fathers, one to our generation, and one to the King Messiah; as it is written, "he was wounded for our transgressions; and bruised for our iniquities":''

and in another place p,

"at that time they shall declare to the Messiah the troubles of Israel in captivity, and the wicked which are among them, that do not mind to know the Lord; he shall lift up his voice, and weep over the wicked among them; as it is said, "he was wounded for our transgressions", c.''

the chastisement of our peace was upon him that is, the punishment of our sins was inflicted on him, whereby our peace and reconciliation with God was made by him; for chastisement here does not design the chastisement of a father, and in love, such as the Lord chastises his people with; but an act of vindictive justice, and in wrath, taking vengeance on our sins, of our surety, whereby divine wrath is appeased, justice is satisfied, and peace is made:

and with his stripes we are healed; or "by his stripe" q, or "bruise": properly the black and blue mark of it, so called from the gathering and settling of the blood where the blow is given. Sin is a disease belonging to all men, a natural, hereditary, nauseous, and incurable one, but by the blood of Christ; forgiving sin is a healing of this disease; and this is to be had, and in no other way, than through the stripes and wounds, the blood and sacrifice, of the Son of God. Christ is a wonderful physician; he heals by taking the sicknesses of his people upon himself, by bearing their sins, and being wounded and bruised for them, and by his enduring blows, and suffering death itself for them. The Targum is,

"when we obey his words, our sins will be forgiven us;''

but forgiveness is not through our obedience, but the blood of Christ.

o Mechilta apud Yalkut, par. 2. fol 90. 1. p Zohar in Exod. fol. 85. 2. See also Midrash Ruth, fol. 33. 2. and Zohar in Deut. fol. 117. 3. and R. Moses Hadarsan apud Galatia de Arcan. Cath. Ver. I. 8. c. 15 p. 586. and in I. 6. c. 2. p. 436. q בחברתו "per livorem ejus", Munster; "livore ejus", V. L. Montanus, Vatablus; "tumice ejus", Junius Tremellius "vibico ejus", Cocceius; "vibicibus ejus" Vitringa.

Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible

      4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.   5 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.   6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.   7 He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.   8 He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken.   9 And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth.

      In these verses we have,

      I. A further account of the sufferings of Christ. Much was said before, but more is said here, of the very low condition to which he abased and humbled himself, to which he became obedient even to the death of the cross. 1. He had griefs and sorrows; being acquainted with them, he kept up the acquaintance, and did not grow shy, no, not of such melancholy acquaintance. Were griefs and sorrows allotted him? He bore them, and blamed not his lot; he carried them, and did neither shrink from them, nor sink under them. The load was heavy and the way long, and yet he did not tire, but persevered to the end, till he said, It is finished. 2. He had blows and bruises; he was stricken, smitten, and afflicted. His sorrows bruised him; he felt pain and smart from them; they touched him in the most tender part, especially when God was dishonoured, and when he forsook him upon the cross. All along he was smitten with the tongue, when he was cavilled at and contradicted, put under the worst of characters, and had all manner of evil said against him. At last he was smitten with the hand, with blow after blow. 3. He had wounds and stripes. He was scourged, not under the merciful restriction of the Jewish law, which allowed not above forty stripes to be given to the worst of male factors, but according to the usage of the Romans. And his scourging, doubtless, was the more severe because Pilate intended it as an equivalent for his crucifixion, and yet it proved a preface to it. He was wounded in his hands, and feet, and side. Though it was so ordered that not a bone of him should be broken, yet he had scarcely in any part a whole skin (how fond soever we are to sleep in one, even when we are called out to suffer for him), but from the crown of his head, which was crowned with thorns, to the soles of his feet, which were nailed to the cross, nothing appeared but wounds and bruises. 4. He was wronged and abused (Isaiah 53:7; Isaiah 53:7): He was oppressed, injuriously treated and hardly dealt with. That was laid to his charge which he was perfectly innocent of, that laid upon him which he did not deserve, and in both he was oppressed and injured. He was afflicted both in mind and body; being oppressed, he laid it to heart, and, though, he was patient, was not stupid under it, but mingled his tears with those of the oppressed, that have no comforter, because on the side of the oppressors there is power,Ecclesiastes 4:1. Oppression is a sore affliction; it has made many a wise man mad (Ecclesiastes 7:7); but our Lord Jesus, though, when he was oppressed, he was afflicted, kept possession of his own soul. 5. He was judged and imprisoned, as is implied in his being taken from prison and judgment,Isaiah 53:8; Isaiah 53:8. God having made him sin for us, he was proceeded against as a malefactor; he was apprehended and taken into custody, and made a prisoner; he was judge, accused, tried, and condemned, according to the usual forms of law: God filed a process against him, judged him in pursuance of that process, and confined him in the prison of the grave, at the door of which a stone was rolled and sealed. 6. He was cut off by an untimely death from the land of the living, though he lived a most useful life, did so many good works, and they were all such that one would be apt to think it was for some of them that they stoned him. He was stricken to death, to the grave which he made with the wicked (for he was crucified between two thieves, as if he had been the worst of the three) and yet with the rich, for he was buried in a sepulchre that belonged to Joseph, an honourable counsellor. Though he died with the wicked, and according to the common course of dealing with criminals should have been buried with them in the place where he was crucified, yet God here foretold, and Providence so ordered it, that he should make his grave with the innocent, with the rich, as a mark of distinction put between him and those that really deserved to die, even in his sufferings.

      II. A full account of the meaning of his sufferings. It was a very great mystery that so excellent a person should suffer such hard things; and it is natural to ask with amazement, "How came it about? What evil had he done?" His enemies indeed looked upon him as suffering justly for his crimes; and, though they could lay nothing to his charge, they esteemed him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted,Isaiah 53:4; Isaiah 53:4. Because they hated him, and persecuted him, they thought that God did, that he was his enemy and fought against him; and therefore they were the more enraged against him, saying, God has forsaken him; persecute and take him,Psalms 71:11. Those that are justly smitten are smitten of God, for by him princes decree justice; and so they looked upon him to be smitten, justly put to death as a blasphemer, a deceiver, and an enemy to Cæsar. Those that saw him hanging on the cross enquired not into the merits of his cause, but took it for granted that he was guilty of every thing laid to his charge and that therefore vengeance suffered him not to live. Thus Job's friends esteemed him smitten of God, because there was something uncommon in his sufferings. It is true he was smitten of God,Isaiah 53:10; Isaiah 53:10 (or, as some read it, he was God's smitten and afflicted, the Son of God, though smitten and afflicted), but not in the sense in which they meant it; for, though he suffered all these things,

      1. He never did any thing in the least to deserve this hard usage. Whereas he was charged with perverting the nation, and sowing sedition, it was utterly false; he had done no violence, but went about doing good. And, whereas he was called that deceiver, he never deserved that character; for there was no deceit in his mouth (Isaiah 53:9; Isaiah 53:9), to which the apostle refers, 1 Peter 2:22. He did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. He never offended either in word or deed, nor could any of his enemies take up that challenge of his, Which of you convinceth me of sin? The judge that condemned owned he found no fault in him, and the centurion that executed him professed that certainly he was a righteous man.

      2. He conducted himself under his sufferings so as to make it appear that he did not suffer as an evil-doer; for, though he was oppressed and afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth (Isaiah 53:7; Isaiah 53:7), no, not so much as to plead his own innocency, but freely offered himself to suffer and die for us, and objected nothing against it. This takes away the scandal of the cross, that he voluntarily submitted to it, for great and holy ends. By his wisdom he could have evaded the sentence, and by his power have resisted the execution; but thus it was written, and thus it behoved him to suffer. This commandment he received from his Father, and therefore he was led as a lamb to the slaughter, without any difficulty or reluctance (he is the Lamb of God); and as a sheep is dumb before the shearers, nay, before the butchers, so he opened not his mouth, which denotes not only his exemplary patience under affliction (Psalms 39:9), and his meekness under reproach (Psalms 38:13), but his cheerful compliance with his Father's will. Not my will, but thine be done. Lo, I come. By this will we are sanctified, his making his own soul, his own life, an offering for our sin.

      3. It was for our good, and in our stead, that Jesus Christ suffered. This is asserted here plainly and fully, and in a very great variety of emphatical expressions.

      (1.) It is certain that we are all guilty before God. We have all sinned, and have come short of the glory of God (Isaiah 53:6; Isaiah 53:6): All we like sheep have gone astray, one as well as another. The whole race of mankind lies under the stain of original corruption, and every particular person stands charged with many actual transgressions. We have all gone astray from God our rightful owner, alienated ourselves from him, from the ends he designed us to move towards and the way he appointed us to move in. We have gone astray like sheep, which are apt to wander, and are unapt, when they have gone astray, to find the way home again. That is our true character; we are bent to backslide from God, but altogether unable of ourselves to return to him. This is mentioned not only as our infelicity (that we go astray from the green pastures and expose ourselves to the beasts of prey), but as our iniquity. We affront God in going astray from him, for we turn aside every one to his own way, and thereby set up ourselves, and our own will, in competition with God and his will, which is the malignity of sin. Instead of walking obediently in God's way, we have turned wilfully and stubbornly to our own way, the way of our own heart, the way that our own corrupt appetites and passions lead us to. We have set up for ourselves, to be our own masters, our own carvers, to do what we will and have what we will. Some think it intimates our own evil way, in distinction from the evil way of others. Sinners have their own iniquity, their beloved sin, which does most easily beset them, their own evil way, that they are particularly fond of and bless themselves in.

      (2.) Our sins are our sorrows and our griefs (Isaiah 53:4; Isaiah 53:4), or, as it may be read, our sicknesses and our wounds: the LXX. reads it, our sins; and so the apostle, 1 Peter 2:24. Our original corruptions are the sickness and disease of the soul, an habitual indisposition; our actual transgressions are the wounds of the soul, which put conscience to pain, if it be not seared and senseless. Or our sins are called our griefs and sorrows because all our griefs and sorrows are owing to our sins and our sins deserve all our griefs and sorrows, even those that are most extreme and everlasting.

      (3.) Our Lord Jesus was appointed and did undertake to make satisfaction for our sins and so to save us from the penal consequences of them. [1.] He was appointed to do it, by the will of his Father; for the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. God chose him to be the Saviour of poor sinners and would have him to save them in this way, by bearing their sins and the punishment of them; not the idem--the same that we should have suffered, but the tantundem--that which was more than equivalent for the maintaining of the honour of the holiness and justice of God in the government of the world. Observe here, First, In what way we are saved from the ruin to which by sin we had become liable--by laying our sins on Christ, as the sins of the offerer were laid upon the sacrifice and those of all Israel upon the head of the scape-goat. Our sins were made to meet upon him (so the margin reads it); the sins of all that he was to save, from every place and every age, met upon him, and he was met with for them. They were made to fall upon him (so some read it) as those rushed upon him that came with swords and staves to take him. The laying of our sins upon Christ implies the taking of them off from us; we shall not fall under the curse of the law if we submit to the grace of the gospel. They were laid upon Christ when he was made sin (that is, a sin-offering) for us, and redeemed us from the curse of the law by being made a curse for us; thus he put himself into a capacity to make those easy that come to him heavily laden under the burden of sin. See Psalms 40:6-12. Secondly, By whom this was appointed. It was the Lord that laid our iniquities on Christ; he contrived this way of reconciliation and salvation, and he accepted of the vicarious satisfaction Christ was to make. Christ was delivered to death by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. None but God had power to lay our sins upon Christ, both because the sin was committed against him and to him the satisfaction was to be made, and because Christ, on whom the iniquity was to be laid, was his own Son, the Son of his love, and his holy child Jesus, who himself knew no sin. Thirdly, For whom this atonement was to be made. It was the iniquity of us all that was laid on Christ; for in Christ there is a sufficiency of merit for the salvation of all, and a serious offer made of that salvation to all, which excludes none that do not exclude themselves. It intimates that this is the one only way of salvation. All that are justified are justified by having their sins laid on Jesus Christ, and, though they were ever so many, he is able to bear the weight of them all. [2.] He undertook to do it. God laid upon him our iniquity; but did he consent to it? Yes, he did; for some think that the true reading of the next words (Isaiah 53:7; Isaiah 53:7) is, It was exacted, and he answered; divine justice demanded satisfaction for our sins, and he engaged to make the satisfaction. He became our surety, not as originally bound with us, but as bail to the action: "Upon me be the curse, my Father." And therefore, when he was seized, he stipulated with those into whose hands he surrendered himself that that should be his disciples' discharge: If you seek me, let these go their way,John 18:8. By his own voluntary undertaking he made himself responsible for our debt, and it is well for us that he was responsible. Thus he restored that which he took not away.

      (4.) Having undertaken our debt, he underwent the penalty. Solomon says: He that is surety for a stranger shall smart for it. Christ, being surety for us, did smart for it. [1.] He bore our griefs and carried our sorrows,Isaiah 53:4; Isaiah 53:4. He not only submitted to the common infirmities of human nature, and the common calamities of human life, which sin had introduced, but he underwent the extremities of grief, when he said, My soul is exceedingly sorrowful. He made the sorrows of this present time heavy to himself, that he might make them light and easy for us. Sin is the wormwood and the fall in the affliction and the misery. Christ bore our sins, and so bore our griefs, bore them off us, that we should never be pressed above measure. This is quoted (Matthew 8:17) with application to the compassion Christ had for the sick that came to him to be cured and the power he put forth to cure them. [2.] He did this by suffering for our sins (Isaiah 53:5; Isaiah 53:5): He was wounded for our transgressions, to make atonement for them and to purchase for us the pardon of them. Our sins were the thorns in his head, the nails in his hands and feet, the spear in his side. Wounds and bruises were the consequences of sin, what we deserved and what we had brought upon ourselves, Isaiah 1:6; Isaiah 1:6. That these wounds and bruises, though they are painful, may not be mortal, Christ was wounded for our transgressions, was tormented or pained (the word is used for the pains of a woman in travail) for our revolts and rebellions. He was bruised, or crushed, for our iniquities; they were the procuring cause of his death. To the same purport is Isaiah 53:8; Isaiah 53:8, for the transgression of my people was he smitten, the stroke was upon him that should have been upon us; and so some read it, He was cut off for the iniquity of my people, unto whom the stroke belonged, or was due. He was delivered to death for our offences,Romans 4:25. Hence it is said to be according to the scriptures, according to this scripture, that Christ died for our sins,1 Corinthians 15:3. Some read this, by the transgressions of my people; that is, by the wicked hands of the Jews, who were, in profession, God's people, he was stricken, was crucified and slain, Acts 2:23. But, doubtless, we are to take it in the former sense, which is abundantly confirmed by the angel's prediction of the Messiah's undertaking, solemnly delivered to Daniel, that he shall finish transgression, make an end of sin, and make reconciliation for iniquity,Daniel 9:24.

      (5.) The consequence of this to us is our peace and healing, Isaiah 53:5; Isaiah 53:5. [1.] Hereby we have peace: The chastisement of our peace was upon him; he, by submitting to these chastisements, slew the enmity, and settled an amity, between God and man; he made peace by the blood of his cross. Whereas by sin we had become odious to God's holiness and obnoxious to his justice, through Christ God is reconciled to us, and not only forgives our sins and saves us from ruin, but takes us into friendship and fellowship with himself, and thereby peace (that is, all good) comes unto us,Colossians 1:20. He is our peace,Ephesians 2:14. Christ was in pain that we might be at ease; he gave satisfaction to the justice of God that we might have satisfaction in our own minds, might be of good cheer, knowing that through him our sins are forgiven us. [2.] Hereby we have healing; for by his stripes we are healed. Sin is not only a crime, for which we were condemned to die and which Christ purchased for us the pardon of, but it is a disease, which tends directly to the death of our souls and which Christ provided for the cure of. By his stripes (that is, the sufferings he underwent) he purchased for us the Spirit and grace of God to mortify our corruptions, which are the distempers of our souls, and to put our souls in a good state of health, that they may be fit to serve God and prepared to enjoy him. And by the doctrine of Christ's cross, and the powerful arguments it furnishes us with against sin, the dominion of sin is broken in us and we are fortified against that which feeds the disease.

      (6.) The consequence of this to Christ was his resurrection and advancement to perpetual honour. This makes the offence of the cross perfectly to cease; he yielded himself to die as a sacrifice, as a lamb, and, to make it evident that the sacrifice he offered of himself was accepted, we are told here, Isaiah 53:8; Isaiah 53:8, [1.] That he was discharged: He was taken from prison and from judgment; whereas he was imprisoned in the grave under a judicial process, lay there under an arrest for our debt, and judgment seemed to be given against him, he was by an express order from heaven taken out of the prison of the grave, an angel was sent on purpose to roll away the stone and set him at liberty, by which the judgment given against him was reversed and taken off; this redounds not only to his honour, but to our comfort; for, being delivered for our offences, he was raised again for our justification. That discharge of the bail amounted to a release of the debt. [2.] That he was preferred: Who shall declare his generation? his age, or continuance (so the word signifies), the time of his life? He rose to die no more; death had no more dominion over him. He that was dead is alive, and lives for evermore; and who can describe that immortality to which he rose, or number the years and ages of it? And he is advanced to this eternal life because for the transgression of his people he became obedient to death. We may take it as denoting the time of his usefulness, as David is said to serve his generation, and so to answer the end of living. Who can declare how great a blessing Christ by his death and resurrection will be to the world? Some by his generation understand his spiritual seed: Who can count the vast numbers of converts that shall by the gospel be begotten to him, like the dew of the morning?

      Of this generation of his let us pray, as Moses did for Israel, The Lord God of our fathers make them a thousand times so many more as they are, and bless them as he has promised them,Deuteronomy 1:11.

Spurgeon's Verse Expositions of the Bible

A Simple Remedy

September 1st, 1872 by C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892)

With his stripes we are healed Isaiah 53:5 .

Ever since the fall, healing has been the chief necessity of manhood.

There was no physician in paradise, but outside that blissful enclosure professors of the healing art have been precious as the gold of Ophir. Even in Eden itself there grew the herbs which should in after days yield medicine for the body of man. Before sin came into the world, and disease, which is the consequence of it, God had created plants of potent efficacy to soothe pain, and wrestle with disease. Blessed be His name, while thus mindful of the body, He had not forgotten the direr sickness of the soul; but He has raised up for us a plant of renown, yielding a balm far more effectual than that of Gilead. This He had done before the plague of sin had yet infected us. Christ Jesus, the true medicine of the sons of men, was ordained of old to heal the sickness of His people.

Everywhere, at this present hour, we meet with some form or other of sickness; no place, however healthful, is free from cases of disease, it is all around us, and we are thankful to add that the remedy is everywhere within reach. The beloved physician has prepared a healing medicine which can be reached by all classes, which is available in every climate. at every hour, under every circumstance, and effectual in every case where it is received. Of that medicine we shall speak this morning, praying that we have God's help in so doing.

It is a great mercy for us who have to preach, as well as for you who have to hear, that the gospel healing is so very simple; our text describes it "With his stripes we are healed." These six words contain the marrow of the gospel, and yet scarcely one of them contains a second syllable. They are words for plain people, and in them there is no affectation of mystery or straining after the profound. I looked the other day into old Culpepper's Herbal. It contains a marvelous collection of wonderful remedies. Had this old herbalist's prescriptions been universally followed, there would not long have been any left to prescribe for; the astrological herbalist would soon have extirpated both sickness and mankind. Many of his receipts contain from twelve to twenty different drugs, each one needing to be prepared in a peculiar manner, I think once counted forty different ingredients in one single draught. Very different are these receipts, with their elaboration of preparation, from the Biblical prescriptions which effectually healed the sick such as these: "Take a lump of figs, and lay it for a plaster upon the boil," or that other one: "Go and wash in Jordan seven times"; or that other: "Take up thy bed and walk." One cannot but admire the simplicity of truth, while falsehood conceals her deformities with a thousand trickeries. If you would see Culpepper's Herbal carried out in spiritual things, go and buy a Directory for the carrying on of the Ritualistic services of the Church of England, or the Church of Rome. You shall find there innumerable rules as to when you shall bow, and to what quarter of the heavens you shall look: when you shall stand up, and when you shall kneel: when you shall dress in black, in white, in blue, or in violet: how you shall pray, and what you shall pray, a collect being appointed for today, and another for tomorrow. On the other hand, if you would know the true way of having your souls healed, go to the word of God, and study such a text as this: "With his stripes we are healed." In the one case all is mysterious, in the other all is simple and clear. Quackery cannot live without mystery, show, ceremony, and pretense. But the truth is as plain as a pikestaff, legible as though it were written on the broad heavens, and so simple that a babe may comprehend it. "With his stripes we are healed." I saw in Paris, years ago, a public vendor of quack medicines, and an extraordinary personage he was. He came riding in to the market-place with a fine chariot drawn by horses, richly comparisoned, while a trumpet was sounded before him. This mighty healer of all diseases made his appearance clothed in a coat of as many colors as that of Joseph, and on his head was a helmet adorned with variegated plumes. He delivered himself of a jargon which might be French, which might also be Latin, or might be nonsense, for no one in the crowd could understand it. With a little persuasion the natives bought his medicines, persuaded that so great and wise a man could surely cure them. Truly, this is one reason why there is an adoption in the Romish Church of the Latin tongue, and why in many other churches there is an affectation of a theological jargon which nobody can comprehend, and which would not be of any use to them if they did comprehend it; the whole is designed to delude the multitude. To what purpose arc fine speeches in the gospel ministry? Sicknesses are not healed by eloquence. It was an ill day in which rhetoric crept into the church of God, and man attempted to make the gospel a subject for oratory. The gospel wants no human eloquence to recommend it. It stands most securely when without a buttress. Like beauty, it is most adorned when unadorned the most. The native charms of the gospel suffice to commend it to those who have spiritual eyes, and those who are blind will not admire it, deck it as we may. I shall, therefore, content myself this morning with declaring the gospel to you in the plainest possible language, without any attempts at excellency of speech. I know it to be the gospel of God; I know it will save you if you receive it; it has saved me; it has saved thousands more. I shall put it before you in plain, unvarnished language. I beseech you to receive it; and I pray that God's Holy Spirit may lead you so to do.

Coming at once to our text, we observe, first, that these are sad words "With his stripes we are healed"; we remark, secondly, that these are glad words ; and, then, we shall notice, thirdly, that these are very suggestive words.

I. THESE ARE SAD WORDS. They are part of a mournful piece of music, which might be called "The Requiem of the Messiah." Hear ye its solemn notes: "surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did not esteem him stricken, smite of God, and afflicted. 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." Do you not feel that the song of softly plaintive has touched your heart to pity, and moistened your eye with tears. "With his stripes we are healed." This is not the brine of woe, but yet it is salt with sorrow. The sun is not eclipsed, but it shines through a cloud. No one reads the inner sense of these words without feeling grief of soul. This is caused by the fact, that the words imply the existence of disease, and speak of great suffering connected with the remedy.

I say these are sad words, because they imply disease. "With his stripes we are healed." This "we," comprehends within itself all the saints, and hence it is clear that all the saints needed healing. Those who are today before the throne of God, without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing, were once defiled as the lepers who were shut out of the camp of Israel. Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Jacob, David Elijah, Hezekiah, Daniel all these were once sick of the accursed malady of sin. All the excellent of the earth among us now, who have been saved by sovereign grace, were once heirs of wrath even as others; as surely sharpened in iniquity and conceived in sin as the rest of mankind. There is a confession here, by implication, of all who are washed in the blood of Jesus, that they needed washing; of all who are healed by His stripes, that they were sore sick with sin. This confession is true, every child of God will join in it, and he that know himself best will make it with greatest emphasis. We were so diseased, that nothing could have restored us but the precious blood of our dear Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It is a dread fact that sin has infected the entire family of man. We are all sinful, sinful through and through, corrupt with evil passions and depraved desires. Our fathers were fallen men, and so are we, and so will our children be. The putting of bitter for sweet, and of sweet for bitter, of darkness for light, and light for darkness, is engendered in all of us. "Every one of them is gone back; they are altogether become filthy, there is none that doeth good, no not one."

Oh, mournful, miserable fact in a fair world, "where every prospect pleases" beneath a glorious sky where stars peer down upon us like the eyes of God, man lives a rebel to his God, a traitor to the truth, an enemy of good, a slave of evil. He who was made to rule not himself. Fashioned for wisdom, he drivels like a fool ordained for immortality, he labors for the wage of sin, which is death. Sin has dimmed his eye, hardened his heart, uncrowned his head, weakened his strength, filled him with putrefying sores, and left him naked to his shame.

The disease of sin is of the most loathsome character. Supposing it possible for every man to have had the leprosy, and yet for no man to have had sin that would have been no calamity at all compared with that of our becoming sinful. If it could so have happened that we could have been deprived of our most useful faculties, and yet had remained innocent, that would have been a small catastrophe compared with this depraving of our nature by sin. To inoculate the parent stock with evil was the great design of Satan, for he knew that this would work the worst conceivable ill to God's creatures. Hell itself is not more horrible than sin. No vision ghastly and grim can ever be so terrible to the spiritual eye as the hideous, loathsome thing called sin. Remember that this dread evil is in us all. We are at this day, every one of us, by nature only fit to be burned up with the abominations of the universe. If we think we are better than that we do not know ourselves. It is a part of the infatuation of evil that its victims pride themselves upon their excellence. Our infernal pride makes us cover our leprous foreheads with the silver veil of self-deception. Like a foul bog covered over with greenest moss, our nature hides its rottenness beneath a film of suppositions righteousness.

And, brethren, while sin is loathsome before God at the present time, it will lead to the most deadly result in due season. There is not a man, or woman among us that can escape the damnation of hell apart from the healing virtue of the Savior's atoning sacrifice. No, not one. Yon lovely little girl is defiled in heart, albeit that as yet nothing worse than childish folly is discoverable; leave but that little mind to its own devices, and the fair child will become an arch-transgressor. Yonder most amiable youth, although no blasphemous word has ever blackened his lip, and no lustful thought has yet inflamed his eye, must yet be born again, or he may wander into foulest ways; and yonder most moral tradesman, though he has as yet done justice to his fellow men, will perish if he be not saved by the grace of God through Christ Jesus. Sin dwelleth in us, and will be deadly in the case of every one among us, without a solitary exception, unless we accept the remedy which God has provided.

Ah, dear friends, this disease is none the better because we do not feel it. It is all the worse. It is one of the worst symptoms in some diseases, when men become incapable of feeling. It is dreadful when the delirious sick man cries out, "I am well enough; I will leave this bed; I will go to my business." Hear how he raves; must we not put him under restraint? The louder his boasts of health the more sad the delirious patient's condition. When ignorance is known and felt it is not dense, but he who knows nothing, and yet fancies that he knows everything, is ignorant indeed.

Sin is also a very painful disease when it is known and felt. When the Spirit of God leads a man to see the sin which is really in himself, then how he changes his note. Oh, children of God, have you forgotten how acutely sin made you smart? Those black days of conviction! my soul hath them still in remembrance, remembering the wormwood and the gall. The period of my conviction of sin is burnt into my memory as with a red-hot iron: its wounds are cured, but the scars remain. As Habakkuk has well put it, "When I heard, my belly trembled, my lips quivered at the voice, rottenness entered into my bones, and I trembled in myself." Oh, `tis a burden, this load of sin, a burden which might crush an angel down to hell. There I stood, and seemed like another staggering Atlas, bearing up a world of sin upon these shoulders, and fearing every moment lest I should be crushed into the abyss and justly lost forever. Only let a man once feel sin for half-an-hour, really feel its tortures, and I warrant you he would prefer to dwell in a pit of snakes than to live with his sins. Remember that cry of David, "My sin is ever before me"; he speaks as though it haunted him. He shut his eyes but he still saw its hideous shape; he sought his bed, but like a nightmare it weighed upon his breast; he rose, and it rose with him; he tried to shake it off among the haunts of men, in business and, in pleasure, but like a blood-sucking vampire it clung to him. Sin was ever before him, as though it were painted on his eye-balls, the glass of his soul's window was stained with it. He sought his closet but could not shut it out, he sat alone but it sat with him; he slept, but it cursed his dreams. His memory it burdened, his imagination it lit up with lurid flame, his judgment it armed with a ten-thonged whip, his expectations it shrouded in midnight gloom. A man needs no worse hell than his own sin, and an awakened conscience. Let this be instead of racks and whips of burning wire. Conscience once aroused will find in sin the worm undying, the unquenchable fire, and the bottomless pit. Though God Himself will punish sin, yet it is a wolf which tears its own flesh, a viper which turns its envenomed fang upon itself. Peradventure many of you may reply, "But we do not feel this!" True, because you have contrived for the present to give sedatives to conscience. I pity you because you are not aware of the truth. I see how it is with you. You think your money making, or spending your days pleasantly, or your performance of your daily labor, is all you need consider; but if you were not deceived by sin you would know better; you would understand that you are God's creatures and that God did not make you to live for yourselves. Which among you builds a house and does not intend either to live in it or gain something by the letting of it? And do you think God made you without designing to glorify Himself in you? Oh, men and women, did your Creator make you that you might live only for yourselves, and make your bellies your gods? Do you dream that you may miss the end of your being, and not have it required at your hands? Will He suffer you to rob Him of your service, and wink at your rebellion, and treat it as if it were nothing? It shall not be so, as ye will find to your cost. Oh, may you be taught now the evil of sin. Spirit of God, it is thine office to convince the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment; do thine office now, for none will apply for healing till they feel the smart, none will look to the stripes of Jesus till they feel the wounds of sin. When sin is bitter, Christ is sweet; but only then. When death threatens, then do men fly to Christ for life. No man ever loves Christ till he loathes himself; no man ever cares for Jesus till he comes to see that out of Jesus he is a lost, ruined, and undone soul. Oh, may God grant you that the sorrowful part of these words may ring in your ears till you mourn your grievous sin.

But there is a second sorrow in the verse, and that is sorrow for the suffering by which we are healed . "With his stripes we are healed." I find that the word here used is in the singular, and not as the translation would lead you to suppose. I hardly know how to translate the word fully. It is read by some as "weal," "bruise," or "wound," meaning the mark or print of blows on the skin; but Alexander says the word denotes the tumor raised in flesh by scourging. It is elsewhere translated "blueness," "hurt," and "spots," and evidently refers to the black and blue marks of the scourge. The use of a singular noun may have been intended to set forth that our Lord was as it were reduced to a mass of bruising, and was made one great bruise. By the suffering which that condition indicated we are saved.

Our text alludes partly to the sufferings of His body, but much more to the agonies of His soul. The body of our Lord and Savior was bruised. Scourging under the Jewish law was always moderate; there was a pause made at a point which mercy had appointed. Thirty-nine stripes were all that could be given. But our Lord was not beaten according to the Jewish law; He was scourged by Pilate, and the scourging of the Romans was peculiarly brutal. They stopped not at the forty stripes save one, they smote at random, according to their own will. The Savior endured a scourging which was intended to be a substitute for death "I will scourge him and release him," said Pilate but instead of its being a substitute for death it became a prelude to it. Probably most men would prefer to die rather than to be scourged after the Roman fashion, and might be wise in making such a choice. Sinews of oxen were intertwisted with knuckle bones of sheep, and these were armed with small slivers of bone, so that every stroke gashed the flesh deeply, and caused fearful wounds and tearings; as saith the prophet, "the plowers made deep furrows." Our Savior's back was plowed and furrowed deeply in the day of His scourging. Now you may look at the Person of Jesus, your Substitute and Sacrifice, covered with livid bruises by human cruelty, and say, "With his stripes we are healed."

But you must not stop there and think that flesh wounds were all His stripes, for our Lord bore more terrible stripes in His soul. He was smitten in His heart every day of His life. He had to suffer the ills of providence. Being a man he had sympathy with us in all those stripes which are the inheritance of Adam's sons; He felt the stripes of poverty, stripes of weariness, stripes of sickness, stripes of heaviness, stripes of bereavement; above all others, he was a "man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." Moreover, He had to run the gauntlet of all mankind. Stripes fell upon our Savior from all sorts of men, for every man's sin laid a stroke upon His shoulder. When He was here on earth, if He saw men sin, that smote Him; if He heard them speak a wrong word, that smote Him; having sinned, we have been hardened by sin; but He was pure and perfect, and it was a bruise to Him to come into contact with sin. You know how His adversaries called Him a drunken man and a wine-bibber; how they said He had a devil. and was mad. Thus they were all striking Him; each man laying on his blow with all his might. Worse than all, He was wounded in the house of His friends. Was any blow equal to that which Judas lay upon those shoulders? And next to that, could anything surpass in pain the blows which Peter gave when he said, "I know not the man!" There was a cruel process in the English navy, in which men were made to run the gauntlet all along the ship, with sailors on each side, each man being bound to give a stroke to the poor victim as he ran along. Our Savior's life was a running of the gauntlet between His enemies and His friends, who all struck Him, one here and another there. By those sorrowful and shameful stripes we this day are healed.

Satan, too, struck Him. I think I see the Arch-fiend ascend from the pit with haste, and, lifting himself upon his dragon wings, come forward to strike the Savior, daring to inflict upon His soul the accursed temptations of hell. He smote Him in the desert, and in the garden, till beneath that smiting great drops of blood crimsoned His face. But this was nothing, compared with the fact that He was smitten of God. Oh, what a word is that! If God were to lay His finger on any one of us this morning, only His finger, we should be struck with sickness, paralysis, aye, and death. Then think of God smiting! God must smite sin wherever He sees it; it is just that He should do so; it is as much an essential part of God's nature that He should crush sin, as that He should love, for, indeed, it is only hive in another form that makes Him hate that which is evil. So when He saw our sin laid upon His Son, He smote Him with the blows of a cruel Not one, till beneath that smiting His Son cried out, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" He was bearing in that moment all the crushing blows of that great sword of vengeance, of which we read in the prophets "Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord."

Put these things all together as best you can, for I lack words with which fitly to describe these bruises from the ills of life; bruises from friends and foes, stripes from Satan, and smiting from God, and surely it is the most sorrowful story that ever was told.

O king of grief! (a title strange, yet true; To thee, of all kings, only due). O king of wounds! how shall I grieve for thee Who in all grief outrunnest me? Shall I weep blood? why, thou has wept such store, That all thy body was one sore. Shall I be scourged, flouted, boxed, sold? 'Tis but to tell the tale is told; My God, my Cod, who dost thou part from me, Was such a grief as cannot be.

One needs to be a Niobe, a dripping well of tears, to mourn the chief among ten thousand made the chief of sufferers. That the ever blessed Not one should suffer! That the Lord of life should bleed! The angels worship Him, and yet Jehovah smote Him! He is so fair, that nothing else is beautiful to any eye that has once gazed upon Him, and yet they spit in His face and mar His lovely countenance with cruel blows of fatal fists! He is all tenderness, but they are all cruelty! He is harmless as a lamb, He never thought nor spoke a thing of wrong to mortal man, but yet they strike Him as though He were a fierce beast of prey, fit only to be bruised to death. He is all love, and, when they smite Him worst, He doth but pray for them, yet smite they still! No curses drop from those dear lips, but words of pity only, and of sweet intercession, follow each blow, yet still they wound and buffet, and blaspheme! Oh, grief, far deeper than the sea! Oh, woe immeasurable! They smite Him for whom they ought to have gladly died, Him for whom the noble army of martyrs counted it all joy to render up their lives. They-despitefully entreat Him who came on errands of pure mercy and disinterested grace. Oh, cruel whips and cruel hands, and yet more cruel hearts, of wicked men! Surely we should never read such words as these without feeling that they call for sorrow sorrow, which if mingled with spiritual repentance, will be a fit anointing for His burial, or, at least, a bath in which to wash away the blood stains from His dear and most pure flesh.

II. Next and may the Spirit of God help us with fresh power THESE ARE GLAD WORDS.

"With his stripes we are healed." They are glad words, first, because they speak of healing. "We are healed." Understand these words, Oh, beloved, of that virtual healing which was given you in the day when Jesus Christ died upon the Cross. In the moment when Christ yielded up the ghost, all His elect might have said, and said with truth, "We are healed"; for, from that moment their sins were put away; a full atonement was made for all the chosen. Christ had laid down His life for His sheep; He had redeemed His saints from among men; the ransom price was fully paid; for sin a complete expiation was made; the redeemed were clear. Let us this morning walk up and down with perfect peace and confidence, for from the day that Jesus died we were perfectly clear before the judgment seat of God. "With his stripes we are healed," or rather "we were healed," for the words are in the past in the original Hebrew. "With his stripes we were healed." My sins, they ceased to be, centuries ago; my debts, my Savior paid them before I was born, and nailed up the receipted bill to His Cross, and I can see it there. The handwriting of ordinances that was contrary to us, He took it away and nailed it to His Cross. I can see it. And while I read the long list of my sins oh, how long, what a roll it wanted to contain them yet I see at the bottom, "The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin." It matters not how long that roll was; the debt is all discharged. I am acquitted before God, and so is every believer in Jesus. Every soul that rests in Jesus was at the time when Jesus died, there and then absolved before the sacred judgment seat. "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" is a fit challenge to ring forth from the Cross where atonement was finished.

But, dear friends, there is an actual application of the great expiation to us when by faith we receive it individually, and it is that also which is intended here. To as many as have believed in Jesus, His stripes have given the healing of forgiveness of sin, and, moreover, it has conquered the deadly power of sin. Sin no longer hath dominion over them, for they are not under the law but under grace. Nothing ever delivers a man from the power of sin like a sight of the suffering Savior. I have heard of a man who had lived a dissolute life, who could never be reclaimed from it by any means, but at last, when he saw his mother sicken and die from grief at his ways, the thought that she had died because of his sins touched his heart, and made him repent of his ungodliness. If there was such efficacy to cause repentance in that form of suffering, much more is there when we come to see Jesus die in our stead. Then our heart melts with love to Him; then hatred of sin takes possession of the soul; and the reigning power of evil is therefore destroyed. Christ's stripes have healed us of all love of sin. Faith in the Crucified Not one has healed our eyes: once they were blind, for "when we saw him, there was no beauty that we should desire him." Now, since we have seen His stripes, we see all beauties unite in His adorable Person. I know, beloved, if you have put your trust in the sufferings of Jesus you think Him to be the most precious of beings, you see a loveliness in Him which all heaven's angels could not rival. The stripes of Immanuel have also healed our hearts. "We hid, as it were, our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not," but now our hearts delight in Him, and we turn our faces towards Him as the flowers look to the sun. We only wish that we could see Him face to face. And He has healed our feet, too, for they were prone to evil; note the verse that follows our text, "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way" A sight of His stripes has brought us back; and, charmed by the disinterested love which suffered in our stead, we follow the great bishop and shepherd of our souls, and desire never again to wander from His commands. From head to foot His stripes have bound up our wounds, and mollified them with ointment. He forgiveth all our iniquities, He healeth all our diseases. Beloved, if you would be cured of any sin, however spreading its infection, fly to Jesus' wounds. This is the only way to be rid of the palsy of fear, the fever of lust, the sore blains of remorse, or the leprosy of iniquity; His stripes are the only specific for transgression.

Men have tried to overcome their passions by the contemplation of death, but they have failed to bury sin in the grave; they have striven to subdue the rage of lust within their nature by meditating upon hell, but that has only rendered the heart hard and callous to love's appeals. He who once believingly beholds the mystery of Christ suffering for him, shakes of the viper of sin into the fire which consumed the great sacrifice. Where falls the blood of the atonement, sin's hand is palsied, its grasp is relaxed, its sceptre falls, it vacates the throne of the heart; and the spirit of grace, and truth, and love, and righteousness occupies the royal seat.

I may be addressing some this morning who despair of being saved. Behold Christ smarting in your stead, and you will never despair again. If Jesus bore the transgressors' punishment there is every room for hope. Peradventure your disease is love of the world and a fear of man; You dare not become a Christian because men would laugh at you. If you could hear the scourges fall upon the Savior's back, you would henceforth say, "Did He suffer thus for me? I will never be shamed of Him again," and instead of shunning the fight you would seek out the thick of the fray. "With his stripes we are healed." It is a universal medicine. There is no disease by which your soul can be afflicted, but an application of the blue bruises of your Lord will take out the deadly virus from your soul. Are you ambitious? This will bring you down. Are you desponding? This will lift you up. Are you not with passion? This will cool you. Are you chill with indolence? This will stimulate you. The Cross! The Cross! The Cross of Christ! What power dwells in it! Full sure if even for Satan that Cross had been set up on earth, it would have lifted him from hell to heaven! But it is not for him; it is, however, for the vilest of the sons of men; and there are no sons of men so corrupt that the Cross of Christ can not purge them of all evil. Bear ye this gospel into Africa, where superstitious sorcery holds men's minds in thraldom, it will uplift before all eyes the charter of Africa's liberty; Ethiopia shall stretch out her hands, liberated from her chains, when she shall see a Crucified Savior. Bear ye the Cross amongst the Brahmins or among the Soodras of Hindostan, preach the Cross amongst a race of men who boast their wisdom; and they shall become ignorant in their own esteem but truly wise before the Lord, when they shall see the light that streams from Immanuel's wounds . Even Oriental cunning and lasciviousness are thus healed.

Do not tell me that we ought mainly to preach Christ exalted. I will preach my Lord upon the throne and delight therein, but the great remedy for ruined manhood is not Christ in glory, but Christ ill shame and death. We know some who select Christ's Second Advent as their one great theme, and we would not silence them; yet do they err. The second coming is it glorious hope for saints, but there is no cure in it for sinners; to them the coming of the Lord is darkness and not light; but Christ smitten for our sins, there is the star which breaks the sinner's midnight. I know if I preached Christ on the throne many proud hearts would have Him; but, Oh, sirs, ye must have Christ on the Cross before ye can know Him on the throne. Ye must bow before the Crucified, ye must trust a dying Savior, or else if ye pretend to honor Him by the glories which are to come, ye do but belie Him, and ye know Him not. To the Cross, to the Cross, to the Cross! Write that upon the sign-posts of the road to the city of refuge! Fly there, ye guilty ones, as to the only sanctuary for the sinful, for "with his stripes we are healed." There is joy in this.

There is another joy in the text joy in the honor which it brings to Christ . The stripes, let us lament them; the healing let us rejoice therein; and then, the physician, let us honor Him. "With his stripes we are healed." Jesus Christ works real cures. We are healed, effectually healed. We were healed when we first believed, we are healed still. Abiding cure we have, for still to His wounds we fly. An eternal cure have we, for never man was healed by Christ and then relapsed and died. "With his stripes we are healed," by nothing else; by no mixture of something else with those stripes; not by priestcraft, not by sacraments, not by our own prayers, not by our own good works. "With his stripes we are healed" healed of all sin of every kind, of sins past, of sins present, and sins to come; we are healed, completely healed of all, and that in a moment; not through long years of waiting and of gradually growing better, but "With his stripes we are healed," completely healed, even now. Blessed be His name. Now, child of God, if thou wouldst give glory to God, declare that thou art healed this morning. Be not always saying, "I hope I am saved." The man who says he hopes he is cured does not greatly recommend the physician; but the man who knows he is, he is the man who brings him honor. Let us speak positively: we can do so. Let us speak out in the face of all mankind, and not be ashamed. Let us say, "As surely as we were diseased, so surely are we healed through the stripes of our Lord Jesus Christ." Let us give Jesus all glory, let us magnify Him to the utmost.

I see now in vision a company of men gathering herbs along the slopes of the Seven Hills of Rome; with mystic rites they cull those ancient plants, whose noxious influence once drugged our fathers into deadly slumbers. They are compounding again the cup of Rome's ancient sorcery, and saying: "Here is the universal medicine! The great catholic remedy." I see them pouring their Belladonna, Monkshood, and deadly Henbane, into the great pot forever simmering on the Papal hearth. Think you the nations are to be healed by this accursed amalgam? Will not the end be as in the days of the prophets, when one gathered wild gourds, and they cried out, "there is death in the pot?" Ay, indeed, so it will he, even though Oxford and Canterbury set their seal upon the patent medicine. Come, ye brave sons of protesting fathers! Come and overturn this witches' caldron, and spill it back into the hell for which alone it is fit. Pity that even old Tiber's tawny flood should be poisoned with it, or bear its deadly mixture to that sea across which once sailed the apostolic bark. The wine of Rome's abominations is now imported into this island, and distributed in a thousand towns and villages by your own national clergy, and all classes and conditions of men are being made drunk therewith. Ye lovers of your race, and of your God, stop the traffic, and proclaim around the Popish caldron, "There is no healing there." No healing plants ever grew upon the Seven Hills of Rome, or are the roots improved in virtue if transplanted to Canterbury. or the city on the Isis. There is one divine remedy, and only one. It is no mixture. Receive ye it and live "With his stripes we are healed." No sprinkling can wash out sin, no confirmation can confer grace, no masses can propitiate God. Your hope must be in Jesus, Jesus smitten, Jesus bruised, Jesus slain, Jesus the Substitute for sinners. Whosoever believes in Him is healed, but all other hopes are a lie from top to bottom. Of sacramentarianism, I will say that its Alpha is a lie, and its Omega is a lie, it is false as the devil who devised it; but Christ, and only Christ, is the true Physician of souls, and His stripes the only remedy. Oh, for a trumpet to sound this through every town of England! Through every city of Europe! Oh, to preach this in the Colosseum! Or better still from the pulpit of St. Peter's! "With his stripes we are healed." Away, away ye deceivers, with your mixtures and compounds: away ye proud sons of men with your boastings of what ye feel, and think, and do, and what ye intend and vow. "With his stripes we are healed." A crucified Savior is the sole and only hope of a sinful world.

III. Now, I said this is a VERY SUGGESTIVE TEXT

But I shall not give you the suggestions, for time has failed me, except to say that whenever a man is healed through the stripes of Jesus, the instincts of his nature should make him say, "I will spend the strength I have, as a healed man, for Him who healed me." Every stripe on the back of Christ cries to me, "Thou art not thine own; thou art bought with a price." What say you to this you who profess to be healed? Will you live to Him? Will you not say, "For me to live is Christ. I desire now, having been healed through His precious blood, to spend and be spent in His service." Oh, if you all were brought to this it would be a grand day for London if we had a thousand men who would preach nothing but Christ and live nothing but Christ, what would the world see? A thousand? Nay, give us but a dozen men on fire with the love of Jesus, and if they would preach Christ out and out and through and through, and nothing else, the world would know a change before long We should hear again the cry, "The men that turn: the world upside down have come hither also." Nothing beneath the sun is so mighty as the gospel. Believe me, there is nothing so wise as Christ, and nothing so potent over human hearts as the Cross. Vain are the dreams of intellect, and the boasts of culture. Give me the Cross and keep your fineries.

You will know this when you come to die, beloved. You will find nothing able to cheer your departing moments but the Savior on the bloody tree. When the man is panting for existence, and the breath is hard to fetch, and the spirit faces eternity, you want no priest, no dead creed, no gaudy oratory, no sacraments, no dreams, you will demand certainties, verirties, divine realities; and where find you them but in the divine Substitute? Here is a rock to put your foot on, here are the rod and the staff of God Himself to comfort you. Then nothing will seem more admirable than the simple truth that God became man and suffered in man's stead, and that God has promised that whosoever believeth in His Son shall not perish, but have everlasting life.

Beloved, if you know that Jesus has healed you, serve Him, by telling others about the healing medicine. Whisper it in the ear of one; tell it in your houses to the twos; preach it, if you can, to the hundreds and thousands; print it in the papers; write it with your pen; spread it through every nook and corner of the land. Tell it to your children; tell it to your servants; leave none around you ignorant of it. Hang it up everywhere in letters of boldest type. "With his stripes we are healed." Oh, sound it! Sound it! Sound it loud as the trump of doom! Make men's ears to hear it, whether they will or no! The Lord bless you with this healing. Amen.