We Esteemed Him Not

Isaiah 53:1-3 ESV

‌1 Who has believed what he has heard from us? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? 2For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. 3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

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As we all gather this evening to celebrate Good Friday what I hope we are all reminded of is what happened on Good Friday. How there came One to this world Who in no way was what anyone was looking for in the promised Christ Who the scriptures said was to come.

‌I want us to be reminded of how the Christ proclaimed that He was Who He is and because He was not what anyone was looking for in the Christ, He was unjustly convicted, and sentenced to death by crucifixion.

‌And on Good Friday, this death by crucifixion was carried out as Jesus the Christ suffered the most agonizing death, taking on the sins of His elect people.

‌Indeed, God sent His Christ into the world, and this is how the world received Him. And the reason why the world received Him in such a way is because the world is naturally opposed to God, is repelled by God, indeed, the world naturally hates God.

‌And because the world hates God, the world then also hates that which God determines, hates His will, and is utterly perplexed and appalled at how He does what He does. And tonight, in our reading, we will see just that.

And before we get to the exposition of our reading, I want to point out that while the Bible itself is inspired by God, the chapter and verse divisions in the Bible are not.

It used to be, many, many years ago, that the Bible was divided by books, but not by chapters or verses. Chapters and verses were not something that were added to the Bible until about 800 years ago.

‌So, over 800 years ago, before there were the divisions of chapters and verses, you would pick up the Bible and turn to a book such as, I don’t know, the prophecy of Daniel; and instead of turning to Daniel, chapter 1, verse 5, or Daniel chapter 3, verse 11 like we do today, you would pick it up and there would be no divisions of chapters and verses, line after line would run together with no divisions.

‌It made it really hard to cite particular parts of the books of the Bible and thus, thankfully, about 800 years ago, some scholars sat down and divided the contents in the different books of the Bible into chapters and verses.

Thus, they didn’t change the content of the Bible in any way, they just made it to where we can cite and pinpoint certain portions of the scripture with much more ease.

‌Now, in most cases, the scholars who had arranged the chapters and verses of the books of the Bible had done an excellent job in arranging them so as the chapter and verse divisions flowed together very well.

‌But you will find, as you study the scriptures, that there are a few occasions here and there where a couple of the verses that are at the beginning of a certain chapter should have been included in the previous chapter in order for the thought to flow more smoothly.

And you will also see that there are occasions where a couple of the verses that end a chapter should have been included in the chapter that followed it in order for the thought to flow more smoothly.

‌Now, trust me when I tell you that I mention all of this with good reason, because the thought that we will be looking at tonight really should have started later in this chapter as the last three verses of the previous chapter, chapter 52, make more sense at the beginning of this chapter, chapter 53.

‌In the three verses that precede what we are looking at tonight, Isaiah, chapter 52, verses 13-15 we read where the Lord had spoken of how His Servant, His Messiah would reign over all.

‌But here in our reading for this evening, in verse one, Isaiah the prophet asks a question in response to the revelation that God had given to him that the Messiah would reign over all when we read in the first verse, where Isaiah asks:

‌Isaiah 53:1 ESV

‌1 Who has believed what he has heard from us? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?

‌The Lord had proclaimed that the Messiah, the suffering Servant would reign over all, that He would be the King of kings, Lord of lords, the manifested God of heaven and earth. But Isaiah, in response to this, asks, “Who will believe this?”

‌This should be the groaning question of all who proclaim the gospel, “Lord, who will believe us when we proclaim the orthodox gospel?” “It seems as though scarcely one in a hundred believe!” “Indeed, they have heard, yet they refuse to believe!”

‌What we wonder is, who has God chosen to reveal His arm to? Now arm means strength. Thus, the arm of the Lord here is in reference to the saving strength of God.

‌What this means is that while many hear the gospel, very few actually experience the saving benefits from the gospel. And this is because very few have been chosen by God to believe the gospel and experience the saving benefits from it.

‌Indeed, as the Lord suffered and was rejected, so are we, His followers rejected, as we see over and over again those who refuse to believe, even as we bring them good tidings through preaching salvation by grace, through faith in Christ Jesus.

We suffer immensely! We say, “Why is there such evil?!” “This gospel will save them! So, why will they not believe?!”

‌And this is maximized further when we survey the situation and know that we are no better than they are. For this reason, that God has chosen to reveal His arm to us, who are no better than they are, is utterly amazing. Indeed, great, and truly amazing is the secret election, limited atonement, and irresistible grace of God!

‌But why is it that so many reject Christ? And we know that it is because those who reject Him, hate Him. And one of the reasons why they hate Christ is because there is nothing about Him that those who reject Him believe should draw them to Him.

‌We read of this in verse 2 of our reading:

‌Isaiah 53:2 ESV

‌2 For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.

‌When one thinks of God’s Messiah, the King of kings, Lord of lords, He is naturally equated to something like a cedar of Lebanon, bursting forth from the strong hill country. But no, as our reading says, when the Lord traversed this land, He was like a young plant, a root out of the dry ground.

‌His appearance was not impressive and thus no one would choose Him out of a crowd, He didn’t appear impressive at all, He was just like everyone else.

‌There was no outward majesty, no outward beauty. When we think of someone who will save the day, we think of one powerful, splendid, glorious, dazzling, his appearance overwhelming to our senses. But Jesus looked like anyone else.

He was rather plain and thus there was nothing outwardly that would draw us to Him.

‌And because this was the case, we read of how the Messiah was received in verse three:

‌Isaiah 52:3 ESV

‌3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

‌Herein was the Messiah! The promised Christ! And here we are in this prophecy, hundreds of years before Christ came to this world, and Isaiah speaks of the Christ as though he is looking back at what happened to Him.

‌Because Jesus was an average Man, from an average town, of average appearance, and from an average pedigree, when He declared the truth that He is the Christ, the response that He received was largely negative.

‌Because He was not like the One whom the people had envisioned the Christ to be, He was despised, held in contempt by others, looked down upon, indeed, rejected by men as though He held no significance whatsoever.

‌This Man, the Christ, was not like the dashing, triumphant King whom the people had envisioned. No, He was a Man of sorrows, a Man well acquainted with grief.

‌He was a Man Who lived His life in constant sorrow and pain, One Who was perfectly righteous, enduring the wickedness of a sin-filled world.

‌Alas! So wicked and depraved is man that when we beheld Him, we turned our faces away as though He were repulsive. He was utterly despised. We look at Him and make up our minds that He counts for nothing.

‌And this, beloved, is our Savior!

‌Isaiah consistently references not only those who are destined for damnation but also himself and all others who have been made righteous by God when he consistently references “we” because this includes all of us!

‌Naturally, we all turn our face away. Naturally, we are among those who shout, “Crucify Him!” “There’s nothing special about Him! Give Him the worst death possible!”.

‌And thus, how amazing it is that for people like us, He died! How amazing that He would apply His blood to people like us! And though we naturally esteem Him as worthless, He is worth infinitely more than we could ever imagine, and yet He loved us, us who really are naturally worthless, and terribly, He suffered and died for us. How amazing is that?!

‌Beloved, why would He ever devote His most sacred head for a wretched sinner, a worm such as I?!

‌May we deeply, reverently contemplate the love of God for us, His elect people, in Christ Jesus.