Part Three: Christ Afflicted By the Father – Isaiah 53: 10-11 (Part 3)

This Good Friday, we see the full weight of our sin and its penalty played out on the cross of Jesus. And, though we know the victory of resurrection morning is coming, the horrors of Jesus being the Substitute for us—the Lamb of God taking away the sins of the world—is more than the mind can absorb. See it…

(v.10) But the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand. (v.11) As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities.

Though Christ’s suffering at the hands of men was tragic, it was God that crushed Him. This was what caused Him to shrink in Gethsemane—not out of fear, but out of holiness. It is beyond our ability to process what it meant for the pure, sinless Christ to be made sin for us, but it was as the Sinbearer that He came.

This is why (v.10) the “Lord was pleased to crush Him.” He inflicted on Christ, on the cross, what our sin deserved—and in that, He was “stricken, smitten by God, afflicted.” It almost seems as though Isaiah is afraid we’ll miss it so he repeats it in vv.4,6,10. Though the hearts of evil men were personally responsible for the death of Christ in time and space, Isaiah makes it painfully clear that the ultimate cause of His dying was the plan and purpose of God! J. Vernon McGee wrote:

Consternation fills our souls when we recognize that it was God who treated he perfect Man in such a terrible fashion. Candidly, we do not understand it, and we are led to inquire why God should treat Him in this manner. What had He done to merit such treatment? Look for a moment at the Cross. In the first three hours, man did his worst. He heaped ridicule and insult upon Him, spit upon Him, nailed Him without mercy to a cruel cross, and then sat down to watch Him die. At 12:00 noon, after He had hung there for three hours in agony, God drew a veil over the sun and darkness covered the scene, shutting out from human eye the transaction between the Father and the Son. Christ became the sacrifice for the world. God made His soul an offering for sin. Christ Jesus was treated as sin, for we are told that He was made sin, though He himself had no sin. If you want to know if God hates sin, look at the cross. If you want to know if God will punish sin, look at the Darling of His heart enduring the tortures of its penalty. That cross became an altar where we behold the Lamb of God taking away the sin of the world.

Ironside added: “It was not what man did to Him that made reconciliation for iniquity, but what He endured at the hand of God, leading to Immanuel’s orphaned cry, ‘My God, why?”

And, in one of the most amazing statements in an already amazing passage, this “pleased the Lord.” Why? How could it please the Father to crush the Son?

• Because in it, Christ voluntarily gave Himself as a supreme act of love;
• Because in it, the perfect balance of divine justice of mercy is displayed;
• Because in it, the rescue of innumerable broken people would be accomplished.

The words of the psalmist echo here, as righteousness and peace kiss each other in the agony of Christ on the cross. The result (v.11)?

God shall see the travail—and be satisfied.
By knowledge of Him—they will justified.
By His sacrifice—all is rectified.

What do you see when you survey the wondrous cross? May we see His glory and grace, and our own unworthiness.