After a month-long break, we pick up again with the third of Isaiah’s Servant Songs in Isaiah 50:4-9.
The Lord God has given me
Isaiah 50:4, ESV
the tongue of those who are taught,
that I may know how to sustain with a word
him who is weary.
Morning by morning he awakens;
he awakens my ear
to hear as those who are taught.
The Servant of YHWH speaks here and expresses YHWH’s provision of His wisdom and prophetic calling and commissioning. This verse builds upon previous passages where the Servant is described as a compassionate upholder of the weak (see Isa. 42:3). With the wisdom of God, the Servant will “sustain with a word him who is weary”.
Indeed, Christ called out to the weary of the world when He invited “all who are weary and heavy-laden” to Himself that He might give them “rest” (Matt. 11:28-30). Christ’s offer of rest to the weary and beaten-down is a clear expression of the Servant’s compassionate power. He does not break bruised reeds. The Puritan writer Richard Sibbes explains: “The bruised reed is a man that for the most part is in some misery, as those were that came to Christ for help, and by misery he is brought to see sin as the cause of it…He is sensible of sin and misery, even unto bruising;”¹
Christ does not beat down His people, who upon His mercy have cast themselves. Instead, He speaks tenderly to them and comforts them (Isa. 40:1) with words such as “come to me and rest” (Matt. 11:28) and “there is now therefore no condemnation” (Rom. 8:1). Sibbes writes, “In pursuing his calling, Christ will not break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax, in which more is meant that spoken, fr he will not only not break nor quench, but he will cherish those with whom he so deals.”²
Christ lifts the weary with a word. He was commissioned to do so as the Servant of YHWH.
“I Turned Not Backward”
The Lord God has opened my ear,
Isaiah 50:5-6, ESV
and I was not rebellious;
I turned not backward.
I gave my back to those who strike,
and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard;
I hid not my face
from disgrace and spitting.
This commission would not be painlessly fulfilled. As we will see in Isaiah’s fourth Servant Song, the Servant of YHWH will be “despised and rejected”. But His obedience to the Father leads Him to (and through) the suffering. He turned not backward. In fact, He gave His back to those who struck Him.
In the gospel of John, Jesus tells the Jews, “For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father.” (John 10:17-18, ESV)
Christ indeed freely gave up His life. No one had any right to take the life of this righteous man. And yet, in obedience to His Father, He laid it down of His own accord, for His sheep (John 10:11). Jesus knowingly obeyed His Father with full knowledge of what that obedience would entail. He did this “for the joy that was set before him” (Heb. 12:2).
The Joy Set Before Him
But the Lord God helps me;
Isaiah 50:7-9, ESV
therefore I have not been disgraced;
therefore I have set my face like a flint,
and I know that I shall not be put to shame.
He who vindicates me is near.
Who will contend with me?
Let us stand up together.
Who is my adversary?
Let him come near to me.
Behold, the Lord God helps me;
who will declare me guilty?
Behold, all of them will wear out like a garment;
the moth will eat them up.
The Servant of YHWH goes on. He understands that His commissioning will bring suffering but it will also bring vindication. He has set His face “like a flint”. Hebrews 12:2 is relevant again here:
looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
Hebrews 12:2, ESV
The Servant of YHWH will indeed be vindicated by God. He knows this. This enables Him to face shame and suffering in the execution of His mission. In verse 8, He refers to God as “He who vindicates me”. He asks in verse 9, “who will declare me guilty?” These words speak of the Servant’s “justification” in the face of a guilty verdict from the world.
Jesus also was justified. We might think of justification as an overturning of a guilty verdict. Christ’s justification was the overturning of the guilty verdict placed on Him by the world. This was overturned by God’s Spirit at the resurrection of Jesus Christ, where it was demonstrated powerfully that Christ was indeed who He said He was. Richard Gaffin writes, “[Christ’s] resurrection is his justification as the last Adam, the justification of the “firstfruits”. This and nothing less is the bond between his resurrection and our justification.”³
Therefore, Christ’s justification is certain and He knows it. The Servant of YHWH endures the shame and suffering of death on a cross because He knows that His vindication is near. His righteousness will win out in the end.
Conclusion
As Christians following in the steps of our Savior, participating in union with His death and resurrection, and being conformed to His image, what does this mean for us?
We can have confidence in facing the sufferings of life and even the rejection and disdain of the world. We know that if we are faithful unto death we will receive the crown of life (Rev. 2:10). The world may strike us and disdain us but we have been securely commissioned to bring God’s word to the nations with the reassurance of Christ’s everlasting presence with us (Matt. 28:18-20).
Furthermore, our righteousness is secure in Christ. As a result, we have no need to worry about if we are on the “right side of history”. The world may hurl accusations and guilty verdicts at us but we stand with steadfast confidence in the vindication of Christ’s work on our behalf. Our guilty verdict before God has been taken and we’ve been given pure vestments (Zech. 3:4). We live in the reality of what God says our legal status is. Our righteous standing is based on His word, not the word of the world which condemns.
Footnotes
¹ Richard Sibbes, The Bruised Reed, (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2022), pp. 3-4.
² Ibid, p. 7. Emphasis added.
³ Richard Gaffin, Resurrection and Redemption: A Study in Paul’s Soteriology, (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 1987), p. 123.