“Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed?

For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground: he hath no form or comeliness; there is no beauty that we should desire him.

He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. 

Surely, he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him. and with his stripes we are healed.

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. 

He was oppressed, and afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughtered, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb (quiet, makes no sound), so he opened not his mouth.

He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression on my people was he stricken.” Isiah 53:1-8

A portrait of the life and suffering of the Messiah.

Scripture tells us that he grew up with love and goodness.

Isaiah 7:14,15: “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel (God with us). 

Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil, and choose the good.” 

He was holy, spotless, and perfect, completely sinless. The only human being to achieve this because he was born of a virgin by the power of the Holy Spirit.

And He is the Son of God.

So much in the verse that he had been given good things so he would know to refuse the evil of this world.

The biggest trap of the enemy is hurting us and wounding us especially as children so that we will be so desperate to find anything that appears as kindness or comradery, that he will use that to lure into worse bondage.

Think of runaway teens forced into prostitution by those who by those who pretended to rescue them. Think of those who pledge their allegiance to gangs, suffering violence and forced to commit even worse, because they had desperately needed to feel like they belonged.

Women and men who find themselves in terrible abusive relationships having been lured by abusers subconsciously playing out the roles they had seen their own parents play.

We could go on and on, the one I truly think we are seeing now are those who so desperately wish to forget their entire lives so much so that they are deceived into changing their entire gender,

I do not believe that this has anything to do with sexuality, for some I truly think it’s a social steppingstone and demonic deception.

But for others I truly believe that they are so hurt, so lost, and so wounded that they are attempting to use a new identity to kill the pain inside, seeming to wish that their former self had never existed, but that will only lead to more pain.

Only God can give us the healing, closures and true new identity in him.

We know also that he is beautiful beyond measure. Yet his physical appearance on earth was plain and nothing about him would make others follow him, as people often fawn after famous stars and other types of celebrity who are also often extremely attractive.

His beauty radiated from the inside, his followers were drawn to him because of his internal beauty, compassion, gentleness, and kindness.

Qualities strikingly opposite of those found in the religious leaders of the day, who were all too happy to condemn, quick to prescribe stoning, and never allowed for any human failure or error, merciless, unkind, unforgiving.

Jesus pointed this out to them on more than one occasion, and that truth convicting their hearts only made them want to destroy him all the more, rather than accept the truth of who he is.

“And the chief priests and all the council sought for witness against Jesu to put him to death; and found none.

For many bare false witnesses against him, but their witness agreed not together. (They lied on him, but they couldn’t get their stories straight)

And there arose certain, and bare false witness against him, saying,

We heard him say, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and within three days I will build another that is not made with hands.

But neither so did their witness agree together (couldn’t get their lies right this time either)

And the high priest stood up in the midst, and asked Jesus, saying, Answerwest thou nothing? what is it which these witness against thee? (Are you nothing going to say anything?)

But he held his peace (did not respond) and answered nothing. Again, the high priest asked him, Art thou (Are you) the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?

And Jesus said, I am: and ye shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power ,and coming in the clouds of heaven.

Then the high priest rent his garment (tore his clothes), and saith What need we any further witnessess? Ye have heard the blasphemy: what think ye? And they all condemned him to be guilty of death.” Mark 14:55-64

They didn’t even recognize God when he was standing in front of them and yet they were the keepers of the temple.

They could never wrap their heads around the truth that he is merciful.

They equated God with a higher version of themselves, trying to attach to him their own human thoughts and behavior, this is one of the many reasons that he came to earth,

He came to cleanse us from our sin.

He came to be the sacrifice for all our sin.

But he also came to show us the true way, the way of love, peace, and mercy, forgiveness and grace. And as he spoke not a word until time came, showing us that all things have their place.

Thank you for reading, we’ll continue on next time on our journey to that glorious resurrection Easter morning!

NBJ 2024/ Rev. N Brown Johnson