My Corner Online
Isaiah 53:8-9
See index to the 2023 Lenten study
March 25 - 29, 2023
ABOUT THE GRAPHIC: I always make my typewritten notes first, and then I pull from them to do the graphic. And there sure is a lot of scribble lines graphics in the downloads, and I wondered why. When I pulled out the fact that justice is twisted and unfair, I had an aha moment that it matched the scribbling graphics. It’s also interesting to me how I saw the hammer to nail His hands to the cross as a gavel. Not sure about that as truth but it makes for thought provoking. The devotion focuses on justice, so this first page is only on the first phrase of the Bible verses that talks about judgment.
53:8 By (the cause of) Oppression (bore the load of burden) and judgment (judged, justice)
After multiple trials, before the Pharisees, King Herod, and Pilate, justice for Jesus did not prevail. Jesus was not treated properly or fairly by the law. Leaders are supposed to administer the law rightly, but corruption exists. Jesus was taken away without a fair trial or real justice. A punishment should be deserved by the guilty one. Jesus was an innocent victim. For us, Jesus Christ became the victim of injustice. Jesus was unjustly humiliated for the sins of the world. On the flip side, the very injustice of Jesus makes us to be judged as righteous by the very One who was unjustly accused and tried. Can it get more twisted and unfair than that?
--Luke 23:15 "Look, nothing deserving death has been done by him.", Jesus was taken away
--John 19:16-17 "So he delivered him over to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called The Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha."
--Luke 23:26, "And as they led him away, they seized one Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it behind Jesus."
Preface: These Isaiah 53 verses are hard! Especially when the translations punctuate differently to make different meanings. I think I’ve got verses 8 and 9 down after much pondering, and I share with hubby and we discuss it all morning until he follows my thought path. Then I get out our old Lutheran Bible study Bible that’s NIV and it’s just wrong because of wrong punctuation. Hubby shouts out “JESUS DIDN’T COME TO MAKE BABIES!” and I cracked up laughing so hard I nearly choked on my tea. It’s still so funny to me that I had to come here to share. The commentaries say it was a tragedy for Jesus to die childless. Yes. Go look at ESV vs KJV and NIV and where they put the question mark. Makes all the difference in understanding the verse. Also descendants vs. generation matters. I do NOT know if my interpretation of Scripture is accurate and do not say it is as I am always changing my notes the next time I look at a Scripture and the Holy Spirit teaches me. March 25, 2023
In keeping these notes in context, it is worth noting there is a question mark at the end of verse 8. A generation is all the people born about the same time, usually clumped together by the decade. Tradition is that Jesus was about 30 when He died and His peers still had a long life to live, but Jesus was cut off from that long life. Jesus died too young. I often feel empathy for those who die too young and their loss of what life could have been. Jesus was cut off from those He loved. He was cut off too soon. His friends and family also suffered this loss. The words "cut off" jump out at me as something that is swift and finite like a guillotine. But the question, the skepticism, is whether Jesus's peers felt this way. We can imagine how his loved ones felt, but did Jesus's peers feel he was cut off too soon? We read about the crowds of people yelling 'crucify Him' that certainly did not care that He died too young, but what about the other people? Was there anyone who cared? Did Jesus's peers feel He was stricken for the transgressions of His people, that being, did His peers feel that Jesus died for their sins? Did they understand? Did they know? Did they not see the Savior when they saw Him.
53:9 Jesus was buried with the wicked and the rich. In comparison to Jesus who had no sin, everyone else is wicked, that is, with sin. There is the phrase that the root of all evil is money, so being buried with the rich is saying the same thing as being buried with those who sin. This burial happened even though Jesus never sinned (specifically here done violence) nor spoke a word of deceit. This verse to me implies that those humans considered as "good" were buried together and those who were considered "bad" or "evil" were buried together. The crowds saw Jesus as a wicked man who deserved a wicked man's burial. This is a prophesy and I read commentaries and other translations where it is indicated that this is what WOULD have happened had Joseph and Nicodemus not changed history. I have always thought all prophecy in the Bible came true. Matthew 5:17, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them." I look at these verses through the lens that Jesus fulfilled them all. It would not have mattered who Jesus was buried with because all have sinned and thereby all are wicked (and we do not like to use that word). We do not know if other people were buried nearby, but this prophesy seems to so indicate. Then there is that Joseph of Arimathea was a rich man and Jesus was buried in his tomb, a rich man's tomb. Joseph of Arimathea secretly for fear of the Jews asked Pilate if he could take away the body of Jesus. Only these two men were present at the burial. The crowds that would have buried in the worst way and even the apostles were not there at the burial. Jesus did not use the tomb very long as He was resurrected in three days.