Crush Him With Pain
Surely
he has borne our infirmities and carried our diseases; yet we accounted him
stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our
transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made
us whole, and by his bruises we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray;
we have all turned to our own way, and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of
us all.
He
was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; like a lamb
that is led to the slaughter, and a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth. By a perversion of justice he was taken away. Who
could have imagined his future? For he was cut off from the
land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people. They
made his grave with the wicked and his tomb with the rich, although he had done
no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth.
Yet
it was the will of the LORD to crush him with pain. When you make his life an
offering for sin, he shall see his offspring, and shall prolong his days;
through him the will of the LORD shall prosper.
Isaiah 53:4-10
Pain. Abject, horrible excruciating pain. Unrelenting,
unbearable, unspeakable pain. With each slash across Jesus’ back and with
every muscle burning step up
In
our let’s-make-everything-okay world we often look at sin and wonder, what’s
the big deal? After all, our sin is not so bad. If we lie
a little or cheat just a bit – what’s the harm? Sin is bad because of what we
put Jesus through. Our sin was the reason for the torment Jesus suffered as He
made His way to the cross – and as He hung on that cross and ultimately died a
horrific death.
If we
continue to sin knowingly, we are in effect turning our back on Jesus and His
pain. It is as if we decide that we don’t really care what we put Jesus
through, we are going to do what we want. To sin in the light of the cross is
to tell Jesus that even His intense suffering has not taught us about the
awfulness of sin.
Jesus took our sin
so that we
might have His salvation.
Our Daily Bread –