“13 See, my servant will act wisely; he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted. 14 Just as there were many who were appalled at him— his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man and his form marred beyond human likeness— 15 so will he sprinkle many nations, and kings will shut their mouths because of him. For what they were not told, they will see, and what they have not heard, they will understand.”
What comes to mind when you see this man?
Courage? Honesty? Hero? What about coward? What about vacillating and inefficient? Would you describe this man as an admitted failure with no will, no courage, and no executive capacity? That’s how members of his own political party described him. Some of them said it was like having a gorilla elected president.
What comes to mind when I read the beginning of his famous speech, the one given after the battle of Gettysburg—“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal”? Legendary? Glorious? How about silly? Commenting on the speeches after Gettysburg, one Pennsylvania newspaper said, “We pass over the silly remarks of the President. For the credit of the nation we are willing that the veil of oblivion shall be dropped over them, and they shall be no more repeated or thought of.” Of Lincoln’s speech The London Times said, “Anything more dull and commonplace it wouldn’t be easy to produce.” So arguably the greatest speech of that century is apparently exceedingly dull, commonplace, and silly, and arguably the greatest leader of that century is apparently failure with no will or courage.
It seems that we humans aren’t all that skilled at recognizing what’s glorious. That certainly was true in regard to Lincoln. That’s even more true when it comes to Jesus. We humans aren’t good at recognizing glory. We need help. God, give us eyes to recognize glory. That’s the claim of this sermon; it’s a prayer—God, give us eyes to recognize glory. We don’t want to miss it.
We will see this in two points. First: the servant’s success and splendor. Second: the servant’s appalling attraction. We see the servant’s success and splendor in verse 13. We see the servant’s appalling attraction in verses 14-15.
First: the servant’s success and splendor. If you are a guest or a visitor, to catch you up to speed this is our fourth study in the servant songs in Isaiah. If you are a guest or visitor, we’ve been looking at prophecies about Jesus in Isaiah to prepare for Christmas. We’ve seen that this coming Christ would often feel as if his work was pointless. “I have labored in vain; I have spent my strength for nothing at all,” as he put it earlier. We’ve seen that this coming Christ would regularly be put to shame, “I offered my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard; I did not hide my face from mocking and spitting.” Now here in the fourth prophecy, we see Christ’s success; look at the Father’s words in verse 13, “See, my servant will act wisely; he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted.”
Jesus did it. That’s the message here. The Servant did everything he was tasked to do. He did it all wisely as verse 13 puts it. He brought back the lost sheep of Israel. He became a light to the nations. He did it all perfectly. After years of seeming futility and shame, he was a stunning success.
Stunning success after futility and shame will move a man to tears. It is one of the most overwhelming experiences in life. If you’ve experienced it, you know. Chris Gardner knew. Chris was a salesman who invested his lifesavings on medical technology that didn’t pan out. The financial strain caused his wife to walk out on him and their five-year-old son. A bit after his wife left, Chris happened to share a taxi with a stockbroker who offered him an interview at his firm. This stockbroker was short five dollars when they got to his stop. Chris covered it with the only money in his wallet—money he couldn’t afford to spend. When the taxi finally arrived at Chris’ destination he didn’t have any money left to pay the rest of the fare so he ran and later got arrested. He got out of jail just in time to head to the interview in just the undershirt he was wearing when he got arrested. During the interview, it became apparent that Chris wasn’t interviewing for a job but rather to be one of twenty unpaid interns competing for one job. The movie The Pursuit of Happyness is the story of Chris and his son living in homeless shelters and even spending a night in a subway bathroom as Chris struggled to get this job to provide a better life to his son. It is largely a story of futility and shame. Here’s the ending. It’s the last day of the internship and the day the boss decides who gets the job. Chris is played by Will Smith. Please play the clip.
Those tears, that exhilaration, the slowly building piano melody, that sense of everything being made right (even the five dollars being paid back)—that’s the sensation of stunning success after futility and shame. That’s the happiness behind verse 13, “See, my servant will act wisely.” That’s the success. That’s Jesus when he succeeds. That’s part of the emotion in Jesus when he yells from the cross, “it is finished.” “Dad, I did it.”
So, how did he do it? What caused Jesus, in the words of verse 13, to be lifted up and highly exalted? What did Jesus do to succeed so wildly? Jesus told the Jews using these very words verse 13—words about being raied and lifted up. He told them, “when I am lifted up, I will draw all people to myself.”
Jesus thought his greatest success—his being lifted up and highly exalted—would take place when he was lifted up on the cross. Jesus was laid down on the ground, nailed to planks of wood, and then Roman soldiers would lift his bloody body up into the air.
We aren’t that good at recognizing glory. Not one person watching the crucifixion said to himself, “that’s success.” Only God saw it for what it was. “The reign of God has indeed come upon us,” one author said it, “and its sign is not a golden throne but a wooden cross.”
Thinking about what the children will tell us in the Christmas program, we could also say, “The reign of God has indeed come upon us, and its sign is not a golden throne but a wooden manger.” A feed trough in a barn-cave that likely stunk of dung—that’s where the little Lord Jesus sat down his sweet head. We aren’t much better than that Bethlehem innkeeper at recognizing glory. We don’t naturally see that washing feet is more glorious than having your feet washed. We don’t naturally see that it is more blessed to give than to receive. We don’t measure success the way God does. We need our eyes opened. That’s how we learn what’s glorious. That’s also how we learn what’s attractive; that’s our second point: the servant’s appalling attraction.
I’d like to think that if I was living in the first century, I would befriend Jesus. This passage, however, tells me to ask myself if I really would; verse 14, “there were many who were appalled at him— his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man and his form marred beyond human likeness.”
This disfigurement most likely refers to the scourging and crucifixion. The flesh on Jesus’ back was ripped off by whips. It probably looked a fair bit like the hamburger you buy in the store. His face was doubtlessly a bloody mess.
Now we tend to get self-conscious about far less than that, right? We wonder if anyone notices that scar on our cheek. We find ourselves regularly playing with that stub where the rest of our finger used to be. That gets to us, but none of us has been so disfigured that we are genuinely appalling to others. Jesus was; “there were many who were appalled at him— his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man and his form marred beyond human likeness.”
People were appalled by Jesus, but that appalling, bloody disfigurement is precisely what has attracted people to him for centuries—the cross is the attraction. “Oh that old rugged cross, so despised by the world, has a wondrous attraction for me; for the dear Lamb of God left his glory above, to bear it to dark Calvary.”
That bloody mess is so attractive that people want to be covered in it; verse 15, “so will he sprinkle many nations.” That language of sprinkling comes from the book of Leviticus. It was a word used when talking about animal sacrifices. That dead animal had an appalling attraction because its death showed that the guilty person would live. The bloody mess on the cross has an appalling attraction because his death shows that we guilty people would live.
We Christians put an instrument of death front and center in our sanctuaries. Just imagine if we had an electric chair up there or a noose. People would be disgusted and outraged. We aren’t outraged by the cross because we find it appallingly attractive. It’s the symbol of the death of the one for the lives of the many.
That’s not to say that everyone knows what to do with it. Not everyone knew what to do with it in the first century; that’s the kings in verse 15, “he will sprinkle many nations, and kings will shut their mouths because of him.” That was the case for Pilate. Pilate was the governor who executed Jesus. He was an accomplished man. He knew what do in most any situation, but he had no idea what to do with Jesus. Even Pilate’s wife sensed that something was weird about this Jesus, and she warned her husband to have nothing to do with him. Both he and her—worldly-wise though they were—had some sense that they were dealing with something beyond their comprehension when they dealt with Jesus; “For what they were not told, they will see, and what they have not heard, they will understand,” as verse 15 puts it.
The world has a hard time knowing what to do with the Jesus. They have a hard time recognizing glory. They don’t see it on the cross. They don’t see it in the manger. We often don’t see it. We often don’t see it. We crave attractiveness and power. We want success on the world’s terms. Jesus appeals to the “hearts of the lost neither through irresistible attractiveness nor overwhelming power but through a devotion to God that was so complete that concern for personal comfort and gain was eclipsed by the desire to serve,” as one author put it. Jesus’ attraction is his earnestness. Earnestness, devotion, a willingness to put comfort aside to serve—these don’t make the cover of magazines, or the evening talk shows. We totally miss what’s glorious. God give us eyes to see. Amen.