Isaiah 53, the latter part of verse 1:
And to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed?
We are, at this time, seeking the answer to that question: To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?
Understand that that is a symbolic phrase. The arm of the Lord implies the Lord’s support, the Lord’s co-operation, the Lord’s strength—the Lord Himself standing by in favour with all His might.
We believe that within this chapter, which really begins at Isaiah 52:13 and finishes the main story that is drawn in such vivid lines, there are to be found the spiritual principles of God which are the answer to the inquiry: those thoughts which are divine laws, divine principles, upon which the arm of the Lord is revealed.
These are of abiding and universal application. The whole matter of the committing of Himself to any person, to any work, or to ourselves—the showing of His arm—rests upon these principles.
So we continue our investigation to discover what these divine thoughts are.
There are certain things which lie clearly upon the surface. You have the record before you.
First of all, one thing that is very apparent is the marked difference between the attitude of humanity and the attitude of God toward this suffering Servant of the Lord. Those two attitudes are very clearly defined, very evident indeed, and represent two entirely different realms: the attitude of God and the attitude of humanity.
As to the attitude of humanity, or humanity’s judgment, concerning this One, we find that it falls into two parts: firstly, that of the Gentiles; and secondly, that of Israel.
The attitude, or judgment, of the Gentiles, on hearing the report and receiving the description, is found in those last verses of Isaiah 52:
Like as many were astonied at Thee
(His visage was so marred more than any man,
and His form more than the sons of men),
so shall He startle many nations;
kings shall shut their mouths at Him:
for that which had not been told them shall they see;
and that which they had not heard shall they understand.
“Startle”—that is the word, rather than “sprinkle”—many nations. Kings shall shut their mouths at Him. That which had not been told them shall they see, and that which they had not heard shall they consider.
The report mentioned in the first verse of Isaiah 53 is the report of Him which had gone forth and had caused the nations and the kings to be struck. They shut their mouths in a holy, awed consternation.
The description produces this attitude of amazement and incredulity. Incredulity: “Who hath believed our report?” Not these incredulous ones. “This could never be the Servant of the Lord! Such a One? Tell us that that is the Servant of the Lord! Tell us that that is the Redeemer of mankind! Tell us that such a creature stands within the plane of divine approval! Never!”
They shut their mouths; their jaws are fixed. That is Gentile reaction and judgment.
And then, in the long passage of the chapter, Israel’s reaction is described. What is Israel’s judgment in receiving the report, the record, the story, the description? How did Israel look upon Him?
A root out of a dry ground. Nothing beautiful about that. Nothing attractive about that. Something you might find in a way and kick out of your path. That is the value; that is the estimate.
Despised and rejected—that is Israel’s judgment. A Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief. “Tell us that is the Messiah! Tell us that is the Anointed of the Lord! Tell us that is the Servant of the Lord! Tell us that is the Redeemer of Israel! No, never! A thousand times, never!”
He was despised; and we esteemed Him not.
You can so easily visualize, with mental pictures, the gestures and attitudes, the looks on those faces: “We did not esteem Him.” A sniff, a shrug, a turning away. That is the meaning of the cross: “He deserved it. God has smitten Him. He deserved it—smitten of God, and afflicted. God has put upon Him the judgment which He deserves.”
They made His grave with the wicked. Well, that means—I do not know, unless that is what would have happened had Joseph of Arimathaea not intervened and begged His body of Pilate. He would have been flung into the grave with the other malefactors, with the wicked.
That was, at any rate, the attitude of Israel—the judgment of Israel.
But that is the early outline. His whole career is brought before us. His birth is described as a root out of a dry ground.
In a sense, it is a very true description. The seed of David seemed to have become very dry.
Also, discrediting Him in this way: “There is no beauty that we should desire Him when we see Him.” There is no verdant glory and splendour perceptible in His coming into this world.
“Who is He, after all? Where does He come from?” Because we know more, we must remember that Matthew and Luke wrote their records of His birth long years after He had gone to glory. They had set themselves, with pains, to trace His ancestry and find out all these things about His birth, and we have them in their Gospel narratives.
But these were not common knowledge in Israel. “Look and see: a prophet doth not come out of Galilee,” they said. “Can any good thing come out of Galilee?” No.
There was no carry-over of human glory and grandeur into this life naturally. He was born with no human prestige.
His life, in the description here, is marked more by negative things than positive. They are more handicaps than advantages. He had no form. He had no comeliness. He had no beauty that we should desire Him.
Do not attempt mental pictures of the appearance of the Lord Jesus, but this is just how they looked at Him.
He had a heritage of woes: a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief. In His life, He was linked with the tragedies of human inheritance and experience—sorrows, griefs, and woes. That is how they viewed Him. This was humanity’s judgment.
“Tell us that that Man is the Anointed One, the Messiah! Tell us that is the Servant of the Lord! Never, never!” Oh, that puts Him completely out of court. There is not one positive factor about Him that sets Him in the rightful position of a chosen and anointed Servant of the Lord, Redeemer, and Messiah.
His death—what a full description there is.
He was oppressed, yet He humbled Himself,
and opened not His mouth;
as a lamb that is led to the slaughter,
and as a sheep that before her shearers is dumb,
yea, He opened not His mouth.
The simple description is: something for the slaughter—slaughtered. Horrible word, horrible word: slaughtered. Sheep and lamb for the slaughter. Smitten of God. That was their interpretation of the cross.
Oppressed, and His judgment taken away. Judgment taken away. Well, that was their view. They thought that His judgment was rightly taken away: all His rights removed, all His claims eliminated, and deservedly so.
Cut off—cut off out of the land of the living. “God has cut Him off, just cut Him off. God has done it.” You see, this is the judgment of Israel, the judgment of humanity.
Humanity’s judgment is entirely based upon objective considerations, without any inward knowledge. That is what it amounts to.
Let me repeat that: humanity’s judgment of a divine thing, some divine Person, some divine work, is based entirely upon objective considerations, without any knowledge of inward reality.
When we take these reactions all together, we find ourselves in the presence of the deep ways of God as He moves toward revealing His arm.
How deep are His ways! How past finding out! How mysterious! But how all-inclusive. When you begin to recognize—I say, put all this together—this interpretation and judgment of the human mind, the mind of this world, about this One Whom we know to be the divine Son of God, the Redeemer of men, put them all together.
Here we are, right in the presence of these profound ways of God: that He is moving, mark you, moving steadily, moving with determination, moving resolutely toward the point of revealing His arm. Tremendous that this should be His way.
You see, two questions arise here. First: this universal reaction of the world of men to this Servant of the Lord—why?
That is, of course, an astonishing thing from our standpoint. An amazing thing, that such judgment and reaction should be possible on the part of humanity universally. But there they are, and we know that they were a fact. What is more, we know that they are still a fact.
The mind of this world sees nothing desirable in this crucified One. We find this universal reaction and judgment of the Servant of the Lord.
The other question, which perhaps goes even nearer to the heart and root of the whole matter, is this: Why this deliberate method of God, making this reaction on the part of humanity inevitable?
It seems as though God has gone out of His way to produce such a reaction from humanity. Why did not God give One altogether lovely, Whom all could appreciate—One Who would stand in the position of acceptance with all men at first sight?
Why did He not bring Him into the world in state, in grandeur, in glory? Why was He not, from the beginning, embellished with all the signs of heaven for all men to see?
Why did God, it would seem, deliberately take a line that would produce reactions of this kind? They would be inevitable. This picture—this picture: His visage marred more than any man, distorted more than the sons of men—all those things, all that picture; and then hold it out before the world: “That is your Redeemer.”
It would seem that God has deliberately taken a course to offend, to scandalize, to produce this very thing. And so He did. And so He did. But why? Why?
Oh, we are getting here now very near to the real point. You see, humanity’s standard of values is entirely false, and God knows it. It is utterly, utterly foreign, because it is the result of humanity’s pride.
It is offended pride, you know. Is it not? It is offended pride. “Tell us that we have got to come down to that—to that level? We have got to accept that for our salvation? We have got to condescend to that level? No, never!”
It is contrary to human nature. Yes, it is, because human nature is what it is. An utterly false standard of values is produced by human pride.
So the suffering Servant is an affront—an offence, a scandal—to human pride and to humanity’s standard of things.
For this very reason, neither Jew nor Gentile would receive the report. Pride would not allow it.
We have sung:
When I survey the wondrous cross,
I pour contempt on all my pride.
That ought to be the effect of the cross. But no: for them, for the world, for humanity being what it is, pride will not accept death. Therefore, He is despised and rejected: no beauty that we should desire Him.
The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ is the deep undercutting of false values. It goes right to the very taproot of humanity’s self-esteem, self-importance, self-reliance, and pride.
It goes right to the very root of life that is based upon humanity’s own prestige and value. Even though a person may, from this world’s standpoint and according to this world’s standards, be something and have something by acquisition, by brains or cleverness, by hard work or study, they may have acquired some position, some glory, some success, some prestige.
If you base your life upon anything like that—base your life before God on anything like that—you are numbered with those here who are in absolute contradiction to the divine standard of values.
The fact is that, when we come to the cross, our very rightful glories from this world’s standpoint are going to be undercut. They are going to be emptied out, poured down the drain.
Look at Saul of Tarsus. Had he something to glory in? He tells us. Oh, he tells us of all his advantages: ancestry, birth, upbringing, training, acquisition, success. He climbed to the top of the ladder.
What did he think of it when he came into the presence of the cross of the Lord Jesus? Rubbish! For him, life was not based upon that, and he knew quite well that that was out of the divine court as a basis of any standing with God.
Believe me, believe me: if you are coming into the fellowship of God’s Servant and God’s Son in heart, in spirit, in truth, that is the way all your own natural values will go. You are destined to come to a place where anything that you have from behind, long ago, before your birth, or in birth, or since your birth—anything that you might glory in—will become nothing to you.
You will see that that thing always contains a threat, a threat to your spiritual life, if you are not very careful.
I am thinking about basing life before God upon that sort of thing. I am not saying that there are no values in those things, but if you begin to bring those into the presence of God, begin to calculate with them, and make something of them, very well—see where you are, and whose company you are in.
You do not come into account with God. God has discredited all human pride in the cross of the Lord Jesus. He has utterly undercut all human glory.
That picture described here, painted here, of this suffering Servant of the Lord in all the agony, in all the distortion, in all that is so terrible, is a portrait of what sin does in the sight of God, of what pride does in the eyes of God.
That is how God views humanity. After all, these people who would not receive the report because of pride are the people who are described, in their very image in the sight of God, by that Man hanging on the cross.
He was wounded for our transgressions. All that we are was put upon Him, and that is how we are in God’s sight. He was not brought there into that condition because it was true of Him, but because it was true of us. That is the whole argument of the chapter, is it not? How humanity sees it, and how God sees it. Oh, what a difference!
But listen again: not only life based upon things that, in their own realm, are legitimate and true merits and values, either inherited or acquired; but, mark you, life based upon assumed importance.
This may be more subtle, and this certainly is more terrible. A person who has no natural right to be anything begins to assume that they are something, to display some self-importance. Oh, this is even more horrible with God.
No right whatever, and yet taking position and strutting about in the very house of God, contrary to the spirit of this Servant of the Lord, letting their voice be heard.
He shall not cry, nor lift up His voice.
There was nothing about Him that was assertive, loud, or noisy. Yet people can assume positions, even in the very house of God, which make them noisy and self-assertive, bringing attention to themselves and assuming something.
The psalmist says:
Behold, Thou desirest truth in the inward parts.
What is true of us, after all? What is true of you? What is true of me before God? Before God. After all, it is before God, is it not, that things are weighed rightly?
Paul said, “Love is not puffed up.” What? Full of air—that is all there is. Love is not puffed up. There is no inflation of humanity in the presence of God. We come into the presence of God, and we become terribly deflated. It always was so: “When I saw Him, I fell on my face.”
Well, you see, this is humanity’s standard of values, and God’s in contrast. What a difference! This disfigured, marred Servant is God’s way of showing us what we are in His sight.
There is something deep, deep in the ways of God. Here, I say, we are in the presence of the deep ways of God.
Humanity has, ever since the day of the Fall, sought to draw attention to itself, sought to draw things to itself, sought to be something in itself, to have glory for itself. That was the heart of the whole thing.
Pride brought Satan from his high estate, and it brought humanity from its high estate: thinking of glory for itself. God has repudiated the whole thing in the cross of the Lord Jesus.
To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? Not to anybody who has any of that about them. That is the answer. Here are your principles of divine commitment.
To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?
But to this man will I look,
even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit,
and that trembleth at My word.
God beholdeth the proud afar off. Pride is an abomination unto God. Look through the Scriptures.
See the cross of the Lord Jesus. On the one side, it is the undercutting of all our self-importance, of life based upon a false standard of values. But on the other side, the cross is the uncovering of that which is God’s standard of value.
What is it? Now, you know very well that the letter to the Philippians is the great letter of the cross, is it not? The great letter of the cross, because the second chapter of that letter is the most perfect complement to Isaiah 53.
I am not going to read it, but you know it. Look; listen to how this part of the letter begins:
If there is therefore any exhortation in Christ,
if any consolation of love,
if any fellowship of the Spirit,
if any tender mercies and compassions,
make full my joy,
that ye be of the same mind,
having the same love,
being of one accord, of one mind.
Doing nothing through faction or through vainglory,
but in lowliness of mind each counting other better than himself.
What a challenge! Would not that undercut all our criticism, even of those in whom we feel we have something to criticize—pointing out faults, calling them by this name and that?
Each esteeming the other better than themselves. That brother, that sister, may have some very glaring faults, but God only knows—I may have very much worse.
Each counting other better than himself;
not looking each of you to his own things,
but each of you also to the things of others.
This word “mind” is cropping up, is it not? Cropping up—this mind.
Have this mind in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
Who, existing in the form of God,
counted not the being on an equality with God
a thing to be grasped,
but emptied Himself,
taking the form of a servant,
being made in the likeness of men;
and being found in fashion as a man,
He humbled Himself,
becoming obedient even unto death,
yea, the death of the cross.
This is the complement, I said, of Isaiah 53. What follows immediately is the complement of the end of Isaiah 52:
Behold, My Servant shall deal wisely,
He shall be exalted and lifted up,
and shall be very high.
Wherefore God also highly exalted Him, and gave unto Him the name which is above every name.
What is the basis of the arm of the Lord being revealed? To whom? To these—to those described in this second chapter of the letter to the Philippians.
If you like to go into the third chapter, you have all those things in which humanity glories, of which humanity takes account, upon which humanity builds, mentioned by Paul as to his past life.
But God did not look toward him in this way of approval and blessing, to stand by that man. He met him and laid him low in the dust, broke him, shattered him, and then lifted him up. See the principle?
It is all so clear. The chief evil in God’s regard is pride. The chief virtue with God is meekness. Always it is like that.
So, this has got us a little further. Look into this great chapter, and you are to discover on what ground the arm of the Lord will be revealed. You are to find the answer to the question: To whom? To whom?
To this One, and to those like Him: this mind—oh, this mind—that was in Christ Jesus.
Well, dear friends, you and I are more and more amazed when we think of this Servant of the Lord, knowing beforehand what He was going through, what it was going to mean and to be, what He was going to experience in suffering, being willing to take that course in order to redeem us from our pride—the iniquity of our pride.
You know that word “iniquity.” You know that the root of that word in Hebrew means alliance with Satan. Yes, there you are. Now you put it: to deliver us from that alliance with Satan in his pride of heart, the Servant of the Lord went down to the depths of degradation.
Here we see what pride is in God’s mind: humanity’s false, utterly false standard of values. Surely that opens up to our eyes the infinite value of self-emptying and having no confidence in the flesh.
The meek and quiet spirit, which is of great price, Peter says, in the sight of God. I leave that with you.
We want the arm of the Lord for us, and not against us. We want His girding, His support, His strength, in our lives, in our fellowships, our assemblies, and our service.
This is the ground. This is the ground.
Nothing that is a contradiction to this will ever find that hand lifted up on our behalf. He will leave us. He will leave us to get on with it, and to wallow in the mire of our own creating, until, at the cross, we pour contempt on all our pride.
We are crucified to all the world, and all the world is crucified to us—and most particularly, the world of our own hearts.
We pray.