Peter Barnes | Isaiah 53:5
SERMON NOTES
PIERCED FOR OUR TRANSGRESSIONS
Isaiah 53:1-12; 1 Peter 2:18-25
– Isaiah 53:5 was one of the texts that Dietrich Bonhoeffer preached from in his last sermon, delivered in a schoolhouse in Schönberg, just before the Gestapo hanged him. Note too 1 Peter 2:24.
1. Our sad condition.
What belongs to us? Isaiah points to four things:
(a) transgressions. This emphasises the wilful rebellion that is part of our sinful fallenness. See Isa.58:1; 59:12, 20.
(b) iniquities. This refers to the perversity associated with sin. God is holy, and we are perverse. See Isa.53:11.
(c) alienated from God. Isa.48:22; hence Col.1:20-22.
(d) brokenness. If we are wounded and need healing, it is because we are broken.
2. The suffering of the Servant.
(a) He was pierced. Usually the death penalty in ancient Israel was carried out by stoning, but this is by piercing. See Isa.51:9.
(b) He was crushed. This emphasises the suffering that Christ endured – Lam.3:31-34.
(c) He was punished. The ESV has ‘chastisement’; the NIV has ‘punishment’.
(d) He was wounded. John Oswalt translates this as ‘welts’; Isaiah 1:6.
Mine, mine was the transgression,/ But Thine the deadly pain (Paul Gerhardt).
3. Sinners blessed.
(a) peace. Isa.54:10; Rom.5:1. Sinners and God are still at war, unless the cross intervenes.
(b) healing. Isa.30:26. Also 2 Cor.5:21; Gal.3:13. Caroline May: O Saviour, where shall guilty man/ Find rest, except in Thee?