Monday, October 18, 2010

A glorious morning

What a glorious morning, the beginning of a glorious day. I slept in, after a Fall Festival at our church that was well attended and well intended.

I read this morning, though, continuing in a study of Isaiah, "It was the will of the Lord that his servant grow like a plant taking root in dry ground. He had no dignity or beauty to make us take notice of him. There was nothing attractive about him, nothing that would draw us to him. We despised him and rejected him; he endured suffering and pain. No one would even look at him -- we ignored him as if he were nothing."

The connection to Jesus on the cross is too much to be coincidence, so most believe this is a prophecy about the coming Christ.

In one commentary I read about the 53rd chapter of Isaiah, it was written, "A MAN OF SORROWS: With an unsettled, transient existence (Luk 9:58); he was opposed and menaced (Luk 4:29); he suffered the indifference and the maligning of his own kindred (John 7:5; Mar 3:21). He often worked himself to exhaustion (Luk 8:46; John 4:6; Mar 4:36). While others slept, he spent whole nights in agonizing prayer."

This I know: Crowds were attracted to Jesus, yet Isaiah said we barely looked at him. People somehow knew Jesus was the Christ, yet he told many not to say a word.

While we slept, he suffered.

Isn't that always the way? We have been walking past the suffering Christ, not looking, not seeing the poor, skipping over the needy, climbing the hills of rejection and going into the valley of the shadow of death. Why? Because we are incapable of doing more, without that same Christ in our hearts and our eyes and our lives.

We thought his punishment was sent by God, but instead, Jesus took our sins on his back, because of what WE did, not what HE did.

This morning, a glorious morning, with the temperatures perfect and the humidity low and forgiving, I think of Jesus. Oh, I do not think of the good shepherd or the doorway or the gate or even I am (God). I think of the cross, the beating, the pain, the bruising, the bloood and I am reminded that He never said a word of complaint because he did it all for me. And you. And all of us.

Isaiah says, "he was put to death for the sins of our people."

Oh, what a glorious morning.

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