SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 12/2/2013
1:12 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
Expiation:
The Smitten Servant
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Isaiah
53:4-6
Message of the
verses: “4 Surely our griefs He
Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him
stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted. 5 But He was pierced through for our
transgressions, He was
crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon
Him, And by His scourging we are healed. 6 All of us like sheep have gone
astray, Each of us has turned
to his own way; But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him.”
I suppose that some people would say that the key passage
in the entire Bible is John 3:16, but this section in the book of Isaiah could
also be considered the key passage in all of the Bible. Why do I say that? Well the message of the Gospel is as plain
here as anywhere in the entire Bible, and when we look at it here it is seen
before the Lord Jesus Christ came to earth with the purpose of following the
will of His Father, and that was to die on the cross for the sins of the world,
to be crushed for our iniquities to have the chastening for our well-being fall
upon Him, and to even be scourged for our healing. All people born through the seed of man are
like sheep that have gone astray but the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all
to fall upon Him.
Dr. Wiersbe writes “Every blessing we have in the
Christian life comes because of the Cross, but this verse does not teach that
there is ‘healing in the atonement’ and that every believer therefore has the ‘right’
to be healed. The prophecy was fulfilled
during our Lord’s life, not His death.
“The emphasis in verses 4-6 is on the plural pronouns: our
griefs and sorrows, our iniquities, our transgressions. We have gone astray; we have turned to our
own way. He did not die because of
anything He had done, but because of what we had done.”
More from Dr. Wiersbe “He was ‘chastised’ and given many ‘stripes’
and yet that punishment brought us peace and healing. The only way a lawbreaker can be at peace
with the law is to suffer the punishment that the law demands. Jesus kept the Law perfectly, yet He suffered
the whipping that belonged to us.
Because He took our place, we now have peace with God and cannot be
condemned by God’s law (Romans 5:1; 8:1).
The ‘healing’ in Isaiah 53:5 refers to the forgiveness of sins, not the
healing of the body (1 Peter 2:24; Ps. 103:3).
Sin is not only like a burden, but it is also like a sickness that only
God can cure.”
One of the problems in our society today is that people
do not look on sin as being serious, but sin is indeed serious, for sin means
rebelling against a Holy God, and iniquity refers to the crookedness of our
sinful nature as seen in verses 5-6.
Here is the conclusion to this:
We are sinners by choice and also by nature, for we are all born with a
sin nature that comes from Adam, and we sin by choice because we are all
sinners. Dr. Wiersbe concludes this
section with these words: “Under the Law
of Moses, the sheep died for the shepherd; but under grace, the Good Shepherd
died for the sheep (John 10:1-18).
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: I think that there are times in my life when I do not
look upon sin with the seriousness that it is, and I suppose that one reason
for that is that I know that my sins are forgiven and I get very lazy in my
walk with the Lord. I must confess this
to the Lord, realizing that my sin is what caused the Lord Jesus Christ to die
on the cross for, and for that I am very thankful.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Think on the serious of sin.
Answer to our last Bible
Question: “The tables of stone” (1 Kings
8:9). I believe that there was also some
manna in there along with Aaron’s rod that budded.
Today’s Bible
question: “What kind of heart is full of
unbelief?”
Answer in our next SD.
12/2/2013 1:52 PM
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