Servant Songs V - Isaiah 50 | The Whole Counsel

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Welcome back to the Whole Council Podcast, I'm John Snider and Chuck Baggett is on vacation so we are again returning to the

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Servant Songs, those four songs that Isaiah writes about the coming of the Rescuer, the

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Servant of the Lord, the Lord Jesus. It's really one of the most revealing and enticing pictures of Christ in all of the

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Old Testament. We find these in Isaiah 42, 49, 50, and 53 and again they are laid out so as each one adds new material, the picture of Christ is being filled out, detail is being added.

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In Isaiah 42, God promises that even in the midst of such a dark spiritual situation that Israel finds herself in at the end of Hezekiah's reign,

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He will send a servant that is the delight of His heart, one whom He will uphold and one that will bring justice to the nations.

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In Isaiah 49, this perfectly prepared servant who is sent for a universal conquest of sin is strangely resisted by his own people and we see the interior struggles of this servant, the

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God -man as he compares what the Father says to what he's seeing. Now in chapter 50 of Isaiah, the third song, the

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Servant of God is seen more clearly here by comparing

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Jesus and His service to another servant, a failed servant,

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Israel. So Israel, the failed servant who suffers because of her disobedience and the

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Messiah, the faithful servant who strangely suffers because of his perfect obedience.

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And this will all set the stage for Isaiah 53 where we see that God Himself will crush the servant, not because He failed, but because He is the sinless sacrifice.

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Well, let's look at these two servants and see if we can't get a clearer picture of our Lord. First, in verses 1, 2, and 3, we see a picture of Israel, the failed servant.

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So let me read those verses. It's a strange introduction for a song, but there's so much there that we need to understand.

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First of all, let's make it simple. There are three great questions that God asks Israel and these questions show us in an indirect way what's so wrong with Israel right now.

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You remember that Israel for some time has been drifting into idolatry and their hearts have been divided and God has entered into judgment with them and they are ignorant of God's ways.

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They ignore their own history. They ignore the Word of God and so they are willfully unaware of what

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God is doing and misunderstanding the present unhappiness of being under the gracious judgment, the fatherly discipline of God.

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They totally misunderstand it and their response shows their unbelief.

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So let's look at these three questions. Verse 1, first question, where? Where is the legal document of divorce that I gave your mother?

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In other words, Israel is acting like a wife who, because of her poor lifestyle, because of her bad choices, the husband has put her away and now she is looking for someone else to live with, some other relationship to satisfy her and she started dating again and God is saying to Israel, in a sense,

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I did not divorce you. I have not put you away. Your sins have made a separation between you and me, but I didn't divorce you and you are not free to date around and find other gods to satisfy you.

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Second question, same verse, verse 1, to whom have I sold you? Okay, well, if you're not a divorced woman who's allowed to date, you're also not a fired employee, a fired servant who having been fired, you're free to go find another master.

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The problem is not that God has gotten rid of Israel as his servant.

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The problem is that Israel in their sin has a divided loyalty in their heart and so sometimes they listen to the voice of God and sometimes they listen to other voices.

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Third question, in verse 2 and 3, why? Why when

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I came did no one answer? Why when I called did no one respond? Very clear, concrete picture, very human picture of God dealing with his people.

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It's as if God seeing Israel's idolatrous, adulterous, drifting, disloyal heart comes to talk to them about this in the prophets and when he knocks on the door, they don't even bother to get up and answer.

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When he calls them on the phone, they don't answer. What's the reason? Well, verse 2 and verse 3, he reminds them in very clearly

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Exodus kind of language. He reminds them in language that ought to point them back to the rescue of Israel when they were in Egypt.

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I'm the God that can do all of these things to rescue you and yet you don't believe it enough to answer the door, to pick up the phone.

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That's why you're unresponsive. Now, before we go further, I think that this just has so much to say to every believer today.

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There are times when our lives are backsliding. I don't mean that that is your perpetual condition because if that's your perpetual condition, that's not the description of a

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Christian in the Bible and you really need to reconsider, are you what you claim to be? But even the true believer can drift back into old fillers.

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And it's as if God gets crowded to the edges of my heart, of my thoughts, and then of my life.

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When God finds us in that condition, Hebrews tells us that God will graciously judge us.

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He will get our attention. It is God's love that makes him do this. It is the power of God that makes him able to do this.

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Now in times like that, if you don't understand what the Bible says about God's dealing with a drifting child, you will fall prey to the lies that Israel believed.

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And that is number one, I'm so miserable as a Christian because God doesn't care about me anymore. It's not that I blame him.

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My heart has been cold. My life has been divided and sinful. So I understand God no longer loves me.

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But that's a lie. The misery you feel when you sin as a Christian, in part, is proof that God loves you.

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Second, we don't respond to the scripture. We don't read our Bibles anymore on our own.

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Or if we do, we just go through the motions. We still show up at church, but there's no yearning of the heart. There's no stretching out of the mind.

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There's no grabbing hold of what's said and responding to it. We just kind of sit there unresponsive and go home.

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And the reason we are unresponsive is we don't believe that God is able to save us. He doesn't want to save me.

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And I don't think he's able to save me. That's obvious. Look how miserable I am. But the fact that you are miserable and all your life seems to turn against you when you turn against God is one of the evidences that God is powerful to save.

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Well, let's look at the description of the servant in verses four through nine.

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We find the faithful servant described. Let me read these. The Lord has given me the tongue of disciples, that I may know how to sustain the weary one with a word.

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He awakens me morning by morning. He awakens my ear to listen as a disciple.

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The Lord God has opened my ear and I was not disobedient, nor did I turn back. I gave my back to those who strike me and my cheeks to those who pluck out the beard.

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I did not cover my face from humiliation and spitting. Would you stop right there?

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Strangely, we're going to see the perfect obedience of the Messiah and the terrible opposition he suffers because of that.

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Well, the description of the Messiah doesn't start where I would have started it. Isaiah starts in a different place.

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He starts by describing the effectiveness of the Messiah's ministry. He has words to say to people that bring real comfort, real strength.

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His words, as the disciples in the New Testament said, they are life. That's where he starts.

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Then he moves back and describes the root system of such a life. And that is that he is a responsive servant.

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So, first his words. The New Testament tells us that in sending the Son, God would send us a messenger unlike any other.

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Remember Hebrews 1, verse 1? God, after he spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets, in many portions, and in many ways, in these last days he has spoken to us in his

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Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the world.

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Does the New Testament prove that Isaiah 50 told the truth? Yes. The enemies of Jesus said, no one ever spoke like this man.

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The friends of Jesus said, as I already mentioned, you have words of life, where else can we go? Or do you remember the disciples on the road to Emmaus?

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Did not our hearts burn within us as he explained the scriptures? No one ever spoke as this servant spoke.

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Isaiah 50 explains how this came about. You might think that Jesus knew what to say to people when he was in those situations because he had kind of a divine invisible antenna, a direct connection, you know, and that God, the

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Father, everything that the Father wanted said just was automatically known by the Son. But I think that that really is a mistaken view of the ministry of the

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God man. Jesus of Nazareth ministers, serves God in his true humanity, depending upon the

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Holy Spirit to give him all he needs for perfect obedience as we have to depend upon the

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Spirit. And Jesus used the same tools. We call them the means of grace, the same tools that we have.

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Now, of course, there is the sinless humanity of Jesus, and there's no sin nature clogging this channel, but it is a true human nature.

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Christ obviously spent a lot of time meditating upon the scriptures, memorizing the scriptures, wrestling with the

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Father in prayer, pouring out his heart, learning from the Father. If you want some good examples of that, just read the red letters, the words of Christ in the gospel of John, if you have a red letter

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Bible, and see where Christ explains how he knew what to say.

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And you will find things like this. I speak the things which I heard with my Father. I speak the things which

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I was taught by my Father. The words that I give you are not my words, but the words of him who sent me.

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How? Isaiah 50, wonderful picture. He, the Father, awakens me, the

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Messiah, morning by morning, he opens my ear. Now, what happens when one morning

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Christ is awakened and he goes and he gets alone with the Father and as he's looking in the scriptures and holding sweet communion with his

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Father in prayer, he realizes this is the day.

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This is the day that you will become the sin bearer. Is there any difference in the response from the

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Messiah to the Father, from the servant of the Lord to God? When what

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God says today is it's time to give yourself for your people. Does the Messiah alter his response?

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And the wonderful answer is no, not one bit. Let me read in verse five and six again and notice this.

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The Lord God has opened my ear and I was not disobedient, nor did I turn back. I gave my back to those who strike me and my cheeks to those who pluck out the beard.

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I did not cover my face from humiliation and spitting. So while that can be a true statement, verse five of his entire life, the

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Lord spoke to me, I did not turn back. I did not disobey. It is here applied particularly to the cross.

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Now the two Hebrew words that are used here are really very helpful. He says that God opened his ear and he did not rebel and he did not turn aside.

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Now the Hebrew words rebel. I did not openly say to the Father, no,

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I will do anything you ask. I will be perfectly obedient for 33 years.

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But the morning that I wake up and you tell me the cross is today and I will be in a sense separated from my

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Father for the first time because I will become the bearer of all that God hates.

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And I said to him, absolutely not. Oh, he did not do that. He did not open and rebel. But look at the second word.

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He did not turn aside. The Hebrew word there is very simple. It's just kind of quietly dodging something.

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So there are two ways that we disobey God. Sometimes there's open rebellion. No way.

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God, I don't care what you say. I'm not doing it. That's pretty rare. It's too embarrassing.

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It really puts us in a bad light when we say we love Jesus Christ and then talk to God that way. But it does happen sometimes.

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More often, we are tempted to disobey by that second word. We turn aside. That is, we simply dodge, we sidestep the command of God and we pretend like he didn't say it.

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And we tell ourselves we are still walking in obedience even though God knows we took a slight step to the right and the command passed me by.

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Christ did not sidestep the cross, nor did he rebel. So how does he endure?

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Well, 7, 8, and 9 in this passage describe the Messiah's trusting the Father during this time of difficulty.

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And that holds him to the course of obedience. Let me read it. Verse 7. For the Lord God helps me.

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Therefore, I am not disgraced. Therefore, I have set my face like flint.

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And I know that I will not be ashamed. He who vindicates me is near. Who will contend with me?

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Let us stand up to each other. Who has a case against me? Let him draw near to me.

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Behold, the Lord God helps me. Who is he who condemns me? Behold, they will all wear out like a garment.

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The moth will eat them. Wonderful statements of the Messiah. How does he endure?

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He trusts himself to the Father's faithful care. I will not be disgraced, he said.

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I will not be ashamed. It's like being in a court of law. And here comes the world and it lays all of its accusations against me.

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But God, my God and Father, is my defender. And in the end, the enemies will just wear out like a shirt that's gotten old and ratty.

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Or like a shirt that's been put in storage and moths have eaten it. When they crash against the

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Messiah, they will wear out. But the Messiah will not wear out. He will obey.

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Well, again, we see pictures of Christ that perhaps we hadn't thought of before. Isaiah 50, the failed servant of Israel, the perfect servant,

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Jesus of Nazareth, being awakened every morning by the Father, listening, having words to speak, never rebelling, never gently sidestepping a command, even when it was the cross, but trusting the

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Father. So, Christian, we have pictures here that can fill our heart with material for adoration and worship.

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It can lead us through an entire day, a week, with just one thought after the next of the beauty of Christ and the incomparable worth of our

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King. But also, we follow Him. Sometimes we complain and say, well,

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I don't know what to say to people when they ask me, when my children are needy, especially when they're adult children, when my friend is needy, when people at the church or people

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I work with, and they come to me with hard questions, and there are hard questions. Or you hear them complaining and their life is falling apart, and you think,

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I wish I knew what to say. Is it that we don't know what to say because we're not preachers?

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We're not Jesus? We're not the Apostle Paul? Or is the answer more likely that we did not wake up that morning and our heart did not respond to the

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Lord, and we didn't sit at His feet and listen? And so, as life comes our way, we really don't have much to give.

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And when God speaks to you through His word, do you follow the footpath of Jesus of Nazareth?

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Look down. You can see it right there in front of you. Even in the hardest moments of obedience, the most sacrificial requirements, the most scary moments where you have to risk everything to follow

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Christ, look in the path in front of you. There are His footprints. He did not openly rebel, and He did not gently sidestep the cross, and neither can we.

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To follow Christ, we trust the Father. We don't rebel. We don't sidestep, and God will be honored.