3436. Christ Glorified

A Sermon Published On Thursday, December 10, 1914.

He has glorified you. {Isa 55:5}

For other sermons on this text:

   {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2534, “Greatest Gift in Time or Eternity, The” 2535}

   {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 3436, “Christ Glorified” 3438}

   Exposition on Isa 53; 55:1-7 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2534, “Greatest Gift in Time or Eternity, The” 2535 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Isa 55 Jer 30:1-11 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 3419, “God the Husband of His People” 3421 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Isa 55 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2278, “Feeding on the Word” 2279 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Isa 55 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2581, “Perfection in Christ” 2582 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Isa 55 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2797, “Need and Nature of Conversion, The” 2798 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Isa 55 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2954, “Big Gates Wide Open, The” 2955 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Isa 55 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 3299, “Ho! Ho!” 3301 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Ps 138 Isa 55:1-11 Ro 8:28-39 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 3422, “Call to the Depressed, A” 3424 @@ "Exposition"}

   Exposition on Ps 23 Isa 55 {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2886, “Restless! Peaceless!” 2887 @@ "Exposition"}

1. God has glorified his Son. How deeply we ought to regret that we glorify Christ so little, bought with his precious blood, owing all we have to him. We make only a very poor return, and even when we are helped by the Spirit of God to glorify Christ, yet I am sure we should always feel an insatiable desire to do it even more. To glorify Christ is so sweet a thing, that when a man has once tasted it, he pants and pants within his spirit for a greater capacity to glorify Christ; and this is one of his griefs, that he cannot praise his Saviour as he wished, hence it is that often the prophet and the psalmist, when they were most full of praise, would tell the earth, the sea, the heavens, and the heaven of heavens, to help to praise the King in whom they saw such ravishing beauties and delights. Hence it is that godly men whenever they are stirred up themselves, and feel that they could magnify and bless the Lord, always want their fellow creatures to join them; and their sorrow is that Jesus does not reign in every heart, and that he does not have a throne in every soul.

2. Now it must be a great comfort to lovers of Christ, who mourn that he is not honoured as he should be, that God has taken care of his Son’s honour. “He has glorified you,” and you know when God glorifies he does the work perfectly, he does it according to his own Spirit, and that an infinite one, so that the glory of Christ, after all, is safe, and though he is blasphemed by rebels, dishonoured by apostates, and grieved by ourselves, yet God, after all, shall not allow Christ’s fame to be tarnished for a single moment by all this, for he has said, “He has glorified you.” I do not know that I can preach from the text, but I do know what I can do. I can feel thrice happy at the thoughts which it raises in my mind; it is so delightful to think that the crown is safe on his head, though the nations rebel, and the kings take counsel against him, that his escutcheon {a} is for ever glorified, untarnished, let men do what they may. God the Father has exalted him and given him a name which is above every name, which is first and chief, and never shall be second, but shall reign for ever, and must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.

3. I. Now glancing across the subject, as some skiff flies over the sea, we will talk about what God has done by way of glorifying his Son Jesus:—GOD HAS GLORIFIED HIM IN THE ENTIRE ECONOMY OF SALVATION.

4. From first to last, Christ glorifies his Father, and the Father glorifies him. Begin with what has no beginning, namely, everlasting love, and we find that we are chosen in Christ Jesus from before the foundation of the world. The love of God which comes to us through Jesus Christ always is the channel, and it is connected with Jesus Christ before the heavens were stretched abroad. He was glorified in our election. Now with Christ Jesus in the mind of the eternal Father, there is no election to eternal love, except through Jesus Christ, and if you and I are chosen, it is:—

   Because Christ be my first elect, he said,

   He chose our souls in Christ our head.

We dare not look into that council-chamber unless we knew that Christ was there. We dare not think of the infinite wisdom of God in the arrangements of all things from the beginning, if we did not remember that Christ was the centre of these arrangements, and that as many as have believed in him were represented in him in those days before the day-star knew its place, or planets ran their round. God has been pleased to glorify Christ afterwards in all the promises, which one by one revealed the glorious grace of God, from that first promise at the gates of Eden, concerning the seed of the woman, right on until he appeared; the hand that drew back the black curtain that hid the face of God was always the hand of the Crucified, and whenever men come to see anything of the marvellous love and goodness of God, they always behold it in connection with the Messiah, the anointed One yet to come.

5. God has glorified his Son in the matter of redemption. There is no redemption outside of Christ, and there is no one to help Christ in the matter of redemption. Albeit that Calvary seems to have a black cloud of shame hanging over it, yet there is no place on earth or heaven more glorious, for it was there that God permitted his Son to bear without assistance the divine wrath which was due for our sins, allowed him to tread the wine-press alone, and would not permit any of the people to be with him, lest the glory should in any way be divided. Christ, and Christ alone, must pay the price for our souls with his own soul.

6. So onward, if you come to the matter of our justification or our acceptance, which sprang out of redemption, God glorified his Son. If pardoned, we are only forgiven through his blood; if justified, entirely by virtue of his righteousness; if accepted, it is always in the Beloved; if perfected, we are completed in him, perfect in Christ Jesus. There is not a single covenanted blessing—as I begin at the beginning so may I continue to the close—there is not a single blessing in the economy of Christ which comes to us apart from Christ, and as we receive these gifts one by one, the Holy Spirit takes care to make us know this: he empties of self so that we may see the fulness of Christ: he kills our pride so that we may see the excellency of Christ: he takes away our strength so that we may behold the power of Christ. In the operations of the Holy Spirit within our soul, while they aim at destroying sin, and at many other blessed results, yet have for their first and chief purpose the making Christ glorified, in the hearts of all his people, in every gift that comes from the hand of the Most High.

7. Brethren, our preservation, our final perseverance, and every other blessing which is secured to us, and about which we have no doubt, all this comes to us in him; we are preserved in Christ Jesus. Because he lives, we live also, and only because he lives, and by virtue of our union with him; we who are the branches continue to produce fruit, but if we were separated from him, we should be only fit to be cast into the fire to be burned. Right away from the gates of hell, up to the pearly gates of heaven, it is Christ Jesus who is glorified. In every step the believer takes, right out of the slough of my despondency, up to the Beulah hill-top of my full assurance, and onward still, beyond the clouds, and beyond the stars in the palace of my eternal glory, it will be Christ, and Christ Jesus alone, who shall have all the praise. God has taken care in the planning if the whole economy of Christ, that Jesus Christ should have the pre-eminence. There is much to talk about there, but think of it; that will be better than my speaking. Think it over: just as Abraham Booth wrote a book, showing the grace of God in all the ways of salvation, so someone else might write a book showing the glory of Christ in every single part of the way, and if we cannot write such a book, yet at least we must feel precious emotions as we contemplate it all.

8. II. In the next place, God has glorified his Son:—IN THE MIDEST OF THE CHURCH.

9. The Church is to Christ what Eve was to Adam. She was taken out of Christ: she is bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. As the apostle says, “For this reason shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and the two shall be one flesh.” This is a great mystery, but, I speak concerning what? Concerning matrimony? Yes, in one sense, but not in another sense. Concerning Christ and his Church; for your cause Christ left his Father and he came into your world so that he might be one flesh with his Church: she owes everything to him here; her very existence is owing to Christ; just as Eve springs from Adam, so the Church springs out of the loins of Jesus Christ.

10. Now, beloved, it is fitting that, seeing this is the case, Christ should have no second place in his Church, and certainly no such place has been allotted to him by the eternal Father. Since I can now only speak of the Church of God at large, I think I am guided for a moment by an evil spirit standing at my left hand, who points with black fingers over to the city of the Seven Hills, and he says to me, “There is one great supreme ruler, the Vicar of God on earth; behold his splendours; see how they bear him through the streets of Rome on the shoulders of men, with canopies of silk, smothered with jewels, and with peacock and ostrich feathers. See how they swing their censers, and how the multitudes fall down before him, for God has exalted him, for God has glorified him.” Ah! but this is a vain and idle boast, for we do not read in any page of this Book of any such exaltation to any being, and where will be found the being that shall dare to take it, unless he shall first become the victim of Satan? Satan said to Christ, “All this I will give you if you will fall down and worship me,” and he who has it must have first fallen down and worshipped Satan, or he has no such power among the sons of men.

11. Now, beloved, Christ did not redeem his Church with his blood so that the Pope might come in and steal away the glory. He never came from heaven to earth, and poured out his very heart that he might purchase his people so that a poor sinner, a mere man, should be set on high to be admired by all the nations, and to call himself God’s representative on earth. Christ has always been the head of his Church. Why! we have read in history that kings at different times have wished to play the head of the Church, and that we owe our Protestantism, as we call it over here, that we owe much of that to the desire of a certain crowned head to become a little Pope over certain dominions. This is very true, but not Henry the Eighth, nor his successors, nor any of those who now live, are more the head of the Church than he is God himself. It is not possible for any to be head in the Church of Christ, but Jesus; God has exalted him, and made him to be the head over all things, and it is usurping the prerogative of Christ for any to suppose they can be head of the Church of Christ, for Jesus Christ is the head, and he alone holds power over ecclesiastical organizations. Over the sacred mystical, blood-bought, redeemed, regenerated Church of Christ there never can be any possibility of any other head but Jesus Christ, the Lord himself.

12. Now notice that God has exalted the Lord Jesus Christ in the government of his Church. All authority, all authoritative rules in Zion come through Jesus Christ; all true teachings in Zion come from his lips. We call no man master on earth, for one is our Master, and that one is Christ. No man is Rabbi in the Church, but he is our Rabboni, our teacher, and all other teachers are thieves and robbers if they teach on their own authority. They only are accepted as the Lord’s shepherds, who speak Christ’s truth in Christ’s name, and in the power of his own Spirit. God has made Christ to rule supremely throughout the Church, and in this he has glorified him.

13. He has made him the head of the Church in another respect; he is the head of all light in the Church. There is no true light in the Christian Church, not a single spark of it, but what comes from Christ. All life comes to us from him. There may be energy in the Church of a carnal and fleshly kind; she may have force and power which she derives from men, but this will die and perish, like the grass and the flower of the field. Vital godliness always proceeds from Jesus Christ, just as the life of the branch comes from the vine. “Without me, you can do nothing, but because I live, you shall also live.” He is the life of men: he quickens whomever he wishes, and it is not possible that there should exist even a grain of spiritual life in any human heart, but what comes to that heart through Jesus Christ.

14. He is also the head over all things in the Church; all spiritual things. The Spirit of God resides in Christ without measure, and he sends out the Spirit; he gives a Comforter to us. “It pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell,” and the continuance of the Church, and the growth of the Church, and the edification of the Church, all kinds of beneficial influences which come to the Church, proceed to us through Jesus Christ, the Church’s covenanted head.

15. Now I wish that we should form parts of the true Church of Christ, to whatever denominations we may belong. Let us cling closer and closer to our blessed Master, for the secret of union in the Church is union with Christ. It is utterly hopeless, brethren, for us to expect, as the world now is and as men now are, that all of us shall ever agree in our opinions about all things. God never made us such creatures that we could agree in all things. He has so constituted us, and wisely so, that some of us catch one angle of truth, and others another. To me one doctrine, perhaps, will always stand out much more clearly than certain others. I wish it were not so. I should like to have a mind comprehensive enough to grasp all truth, to attain the completed picture of truth without ever caricaturing a single feature, but I am deeply conscious I am far from being able to do that, and I think, without being censorious, I may say I do not know any of my fellow creatures; but there is in them a warp somewhere or other in the judgment of good men, some mistake of some man which is not an offensive mistake at all. This is rather an infirmity than a sin, for he follows what he thinks is truth; his eyes are not right, he has a little squint, and he thinks truth is a thing that it is not; he shoots well, notice that, if the mark were where he thinks it is, but it is not just there, and therefore his arrow does not quite hit the centre of the target.

16. The true place of union will be, notice that, never in the creed but in him who is the truth. If we believe in him, love him, cling to him, follow him, imitate him, glorify him, we shall get nearer each other than we ever were, closer to the common centre; we must be closer to each other. “I would preach up nothing but Christ, and preach nothing down but sin,” said a good old divine, and the good man was right there. Some old lady who heard of certain high Calvinistic preachers coming to a certain place did not know who they were, or what they were, but she said she thought she liked them because of their names. She misunderstood the words, and she thought they were high Calvary preachers, and anyone who preached high Calvary would suit her if they lifted up the cross of Jesus, and preached up the Master, and glorified his name. If in doubt, this should be the test of the doctrine: Does it glorify Christ? This should be the test of all our opinions: Do they glorify Christ? For nothing is fit to be within the walls of Zion but what bows down before Zion’s King.

17. III. To change the tone, again ringing the same peal of bells, in the third place:—GOD HAS HIGHLY EXALTED HIS DEAR SON IN THE ACHIEVEMENT OF THE CROSS.

18. Oh! for a poet’s mind and seraph’s tongue to speak of the wonders of the cross, where Christ the Saviour hung and died, he died in shame; this never dimmed his glory; it reveals it to the admiring eyes of all the aged saints, who delight to look into it.

19. What did Jesus, by his dying a painful death, do for us? Why, first, as you all know, he put away all his people’s sins. There are some who think that Christ died to make all men salvable. They may keep their doctrine: it has no charms for me: that Christ died, some think, for all men, and it is a death for every man, I know the Word of God declares; but there is a redemption, there is a redemption far other than what is universal. He laid down his life for his sheep: he loved his Church and gave himself for it, and there is a people spoken of who are redeemed from among men in quite another sense, in which any redemption was ever made for all men. Now, beloved, as many as Christ stood for as a substitute, for so many did he take their sins, and although it is written, “The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all,” for “he was made sin for us,” says the apostle, and the sin of his people was actually laid on him, imputed to him, though it was not his, yet he took it for his people, and here is the glory, that all that mass of sin no longer exists; it is gone; he has vanquished the tyrant and “made an end of sin.” What a wonderful word—made an end of it, and brought in everlasting righteousness; he has cast our iniquities into the depths of the sea. The blood of Christ exterminated our sins when he stood in the place of his people; he suffered an equivalent for all that was due by them and from them to God, and the debts have ceased to be, for they are all paid and disposed of, no charge being brought against Christ’s elect, for, says the apostle, “It is Christ who died; yes, rather who has risen again.” In the morning when the Father raised his Son from the dead, and Jesus stood once more on earth, no more to die, in that day the sentence went out, “No one shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect.” Oh! what a blessed work was this to do: to take sin away where it never can be found again: to make it to cease to be: to cover it over for ever: to blot it out. But this was not all; our Lord by his death destroyed death, and him who has the power over it, and that is the devil.

20. But let us think: he disposed of death first of all. He slept in the tomb: when the morning came the prison door was opened, and he rose the firstborn from the dead, the first-fruits of those who sleep, and the harvest sheaf of all who shall come from now on from the sepulchre; and so now the tomb is no more a mortuary, a place of ruin; the big imprisoning stone is rolled away. “He who lives and believes in Christ shall never die, and he who believes in him, though he were dead, yet he shall live.” Over that cemetery, with its holy memories and long-lamented departed, I hear a voice ringing, “‘Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord; yes,’ says the Spirit, ‘for they rest from their labours, and their works follow them.’” And in another case, beloved, “I am the resurrection and the life; death is dead.” Jesus Christ has accomplished this, and the Father has glorified him.

21. And now he has also vanquished, once and for all, for his people, all the hosts of hell. Satan is a cruel enemy to the Lord’s people; he molests them, he troubles those whom he cannot devour; but here is our consolation, that he has an invincible enemy. Christ gave Satan every advantage; he met him as an old divine says, “on his own dunghill”; he defied the lion in his den; indeed, he defied him on his own hill. “This is your own hour,” he says; Satan’s own hour, and the hour of darkness; but Jesus triumphed, triumphed when all the artillery of hell was discharged against him, when all the floods out of the mouth of the dragon were vented out on him; he vanquished all the hosts, and bears the banner of a glorious triumph today, “having led captives captive, and ascended up on high.”

22. To tell of all the wonders of the cross of Calvary would take far longer than the time we can allot to it now, but we may sum it all up in the words of the text, “He has glorified you.” The Father has put many crowns on the head of him who wore the crown of thorns.

23. I wish to ask a minute’s attention to the next, namely, that the Father has glorified Christ in his present power: the Father sustains him in the highest heavens among the saints. It is a great glory that Christ should sit at the right hand of the Father, as he now does. He was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, but now is crowned with glory and honour, and the loftiest created beings delight to do his commands. He reigns in heaven with an undisputed sceptre. He says to this one, “Go, and he goes; to another, come, and he comes.” His intercession in heaven is part of the glory he has received; as he pleads there like a high priest, he pleads with authority, with a power that is always felt. The blood of Jesus Christ speaks to the heart of God, and every desire of Christ’s is granted when heard. A case put into Christ’s hands always succeeds; if we ask the Father in Christ’s name, he will do it for us. I am sure very few of us know this, that if we ask in Christ’s name, we ask for Christ’s sake, and that is right and good, and that is as far as we get; but do you know the difference? If you go to a man and say, “Give me such and such, for the sake of such a friend, he deserves it from you,” that is a good plea; but suppose that friend arms you with this power, and he says, “Now you may go, and ask for it in my name; say I sent you; use my name,” why, that is by far more powerful, and when each Christian becomes clothed, as it were, with that power from Christ, so that he asks God in Christ’s name as though Christ asked, what power is here! And it is part of the glory of Christ that his intercession should be so powerful for his people today.

24. And, brethren, think how the Father has exalted Christ, in that at this time he is receiving every hour some of the purchase of his blood. I have sometimes tried to picture in my eye the delight of Christ, the gleaming of his eyes of love, as his blood-bought ones come home one by one. You know it is his prayer, “Father, I will that they also whom you have given me be with me where I am.” Here they come, one after another; some from this church; one yesterday; two or three a week usually, they come up into the bosom of Christ. You know how the farmer rejoices as he sees the loaded wagons coming one by one to the barn; but he has sowed, not with blood, though he may have sowed with tears. You know how you and I rejoice as we think we have been the means of the conversion of someone, but what is the joy of Christ as he sees the perfection of his goodness? Christ is exalted, new crowns are laid at his feet; the eternal Spirit, as he brings and conducts the chosen spirit up to Christ, glorifies him.

25. And here below, brethren, let us add, as we leave this point, Jesus Christ is glorified in the power which he possesses in the conversion of souls. Wherever his name is preached, it becomes like ointment poured out. I have no belief in the preaching of Christ unsuccessfully. I think a dear brother may preach the gospel for years and see no conversions, and perhaps there may be none just then, but they will come. I will not say this to myself to comfort myself. I should be afraid I was on the wrong track if I did not see them, and I would say to those who preach the Master’s Word faithfully, “It shall not return to me void.” Christ is greatly glorified when his gospel becomes a heart-breaker, like a hammer; when it dashes the rock in pieces and becomes like a fire. Christ is glorified when a prostitute gives up her evil trade; when the thief casts down the tools of his infamy; when the drunkard lifts his last drop to his lips; when the blasphemer washes out his mouth, and resolves to drink no more of the wine of cursing. May God grant us that we may always pray that God will glorify Christ in marvellous and obvious conversions: extraordinary sinners, being snatched from between the teeth of the old lion, and made to dedicate the rest of their days to King Jesus.

26. IV. Now to close:—GOD HAS GLORIFIED CHRIST IN HIS KINGDOM.

27. We have already said that Christ is glorified in his spiritual kingdom in the midst of Zion. One is tempted to enlarge on that. The King is always glorious when he rules his people by good laws, when he has a happy and prosperous people. But our Lord Jesus Christ rules us with the best of laws, and happy are the citizens of the new Jerusalem.

   The King is glorious

   When in war he is victorious.

And when he is beloved by his subjects, he certainly is victorious in war. The spoils belong to him; all the virgins love him, and the saintly sons consecrate their purest affections to him.

28. Jesus Christ is exalted in his Church, then, as a King on his throne, and there God gives him glory for the present among the nations. Christ’s glory is not revealed as we desire it, though he rules by moral influence, and the government is upon his shoulders; perhaps, if our eyes were opened, we should see in the progress of civilization and the various changes which have taken place in this world, much more of the influences of Christianity, and certainly of the power of Christ than we have been able to perceive at all times. Perhaps God is writing now, and has been during this last six thousand years, a wonderful drama, at the clearing up of which it will be seen from the first stroke of his pen to the last, God has glorified Christ. It may be so that the shaking of the nations, the revolutions, and even the bloody wars, shall all be summed up, and the one great summary of which it might be said at the beginning, as Virgil does in song:—

   “Arms and the man I sing.”

It may be that he has written a great epic concerning the warfare of the righteous against evil, and the conquest of the mighty men.

29. He has yet to restore this world, and make it brighter than it was before, and, beloved, that God will exalt Christ in the latter days, let us never doubt that for a moment, and though men prophesy, making a profit by their prophecies, and are for ever muddling and unsettling weak minds by their silly predictions, let us still hold to it that this world belongs to Christ, who bought it with his precious blood, and he will have it, every inch, and there is not a corner where the dark places of cruelty shall remain, not a place where an idol shall hold its throne, not a hill or valley where superstition shall be permitted to linger. We only have to wait; maybe we shall be gathered to our Father to wait in more serene places than this, for it is ordained, and no one shall prevent its coming, when Christ shall reign on earth with his ancient glory, and the whole earth, once an Augean stable, {b} shall be cleansed by its Hercules, who shall make the stream of his blood to run through it, and make it pure, glorified, and consecrated. And in that day the sceptres shall be gathered with those who remain, and crowns of kings shall be joyfully laid at his feet, and we shall understand the full meaning of the title, “King of kings and Lord of lords.” Oh! how we will greet him in that day when we shall rise to participate in the splendours with those who are alive and remain. Dear friends, those who are asleep shall rise to participate in all the splendour of that blessed land of King Jesus. My Father has exalted you; to you, your Master’s children bow. The sun and the moon bow down before you; you shall reign, and we shall reign with you; our reign being to behold your reign; our glory being to participate in your glory. We shall be like you, for we shall see you as you are. May God grant us grace to have our share in that blessed advent, and he shall be blessed.

30. But now just one more word. God will glorify Christ, notice that, as he has done. Are we prepared to do the same, my dear brother and sister? Let us aim to glorify Christ, and shall I tell you how you may do it, for there are many small ways of doing it, not small in themselves, but only small comparatively. You can glorify Christ by your holy living, by your labours for his kingdom, by your generosities; or, if you want to do the greatest work to glorify Christ, you know what it is. Why, it is to trust him altogether with all your concerns. Nothing glorifies Christ more than that. Now just lean your whole weight on him, and, with a faith that does not stagger, rely on the efficacy of his blood, the power of his arm, the love of his heart, and the immutability of his affections, and the divinity of his presence; lean on him, rest on him. A poor dependent creature cannot glorify God in any better way than by trusting him. This is the work of God, you know; this is a Hebraism, for the greatest work of all; this is the work of God, the godlike work, the work. But what a mercy there is such a way for poor creatures like us, of glorifying Christ by trusting him.

   The best return for one like me.

      So wretched and so poor,

   Is from his gifts to draw a plea,

      And ask him still for more.

31. One other remark, and that is, if you do not glorify Jesus Christ willingly and cheerfully by such a trust, he will be glorified even in your condemnation. In the day of his appearing, you who have heard the gospel, for I speak to you only, if you reject him, you will still have to minister to his honour. “Kiss the son, lest he be angry and you perish from the way, if his wrath is kindled only a little. Blessed are all those who put their trust in him.” But if you do not trust him, here is the alternative: he shall “break the nations with a rod of iron, he shall dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” How does it stand with you? Will you be able to endure that iron rod? Will you be able to endure the breaking, when first the body shall be broken, and then the soul to pieces, like a potter’s vessel? Be wise, therefore, oh! you kings and you men, sons of the earth, be wise, bow before him, accept him as your King. So God will be glorified by the work of Christ, and if it is not so, he will be glorified by the aid of justice, which may the Lord forbid in the case of any one of us. Amen.

{a} Escutcheon: Shield containing a coat of arms. OED.
{b} Augean: Abominably filthy; i.e. resembling the stable of Augeas, a fabulous king of Elis, which contained 3000 oxen, and had been uncleansed for 30 years, when Hercules, by turning the river Alpheus through it, purified it in a single day. OED.

Exposition By C. H. Spurgeon {Isa 53}

1. Who has believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?

The prophet seems to speak in the name of all the prophets, lamenting the general unbelief concerning Jesus Christ, the Son of God. The report concerning him is very clear. It comes from God: it is for our salvation. And yet how many doubt it! In fact, everyone does until the arm of the Lord is revealed, until he works on the hearts of men, and they are led to believe in Jesus. And here is the difficulty of belief.

2. For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he has no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.

There was nothing about Jesus Christ to attract the attention of those who look for pomp and splendour. His religion is all simplicity: it is plain truth; there is nothing about it that is gorgeous to attract those who look for ritualistic vanities. To most men there is no beauty in him that they should desire him.

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

It was so with Jesus when he was here. He was the greatest of all sufferers: there were few who followed him; some of those who did betrayed him. There were only a few who would stand up for him: he was met everywhere with a repulse, and yet he came on an errand of love. He did not need to have come at all. Heaven surely was large enough for him; but such was his compassion for the dying sons of men that he needed to strip off his royal robes and put on the robes of our mortal flesh.

4, 5. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows: yet we esteemed him struck, struck by 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.

He had not a pang to suffer on his own account, nothing to cause him grief in anything he had done:—

   For sins not his own, he died to atone;

   Was love or was sorrow like this ever known?

Scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet, perhaps, for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commends his love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

6. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

Taken the full load of sin, the whole mass of human guilt, and placed it on him. He was perfectly innocent, and yet the sin of man was heaped on him. He was our substitute, standing in our place: this was a wonderful truth!

7. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he does not open his mouth,

And you know very well that our Master would not speak when he was charged before Pilate and Herod: he was eloquent—more eloquent in his silence than if he had used his ordinary language, which was wonderful, for “never a man spoke like this man,” and yet never man was silent as he for our sake.

8-10. 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: he was struck for the transgression of my people. And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he has put him to grief: when you shall make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.

Our blessed Lord and Master is to have a full reward for all his griefs and part of that reward is here tonight. He will receive this very night some born to him by the new birth, who shall from now on be his children, and who shall gladly say, “Here, Lord, I come myself to you, for you have bought me by your precious blood.” It is the joy of some of us that we belong altogether to Christ. We would not have another honour: we wish to live for him, loving him and serving him, as long as we have any being. And there are some here tonight who have not felt this, whom God, nevertheless, will make to feel it, for so runs the promise:—

11. He shall see the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge my righteous servant shall justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities.

That is the way he justifies them—takes their iniquities upon himself; and since a thing cannot be in two places at one time, when Christ takes our iniquities, they are gone, and we are just in the sight of God. He takes the burden, and we are unloaded, blessed be his name! “He shall bear their iniquities.”

12. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong:

The dying Christ has risen again, and he is a great conqueror now, and divides the spoil. Those spoils are human hearts, and the true love and deep devotion of those he has redeemed. He shall have this:—

12. Because he has poured out his soul to death: and he was numbered with the transgressors: and he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.

And he is doing it now; pleading this very night that old prayer of his, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” Oh! let you and I be pardoned with that plea.