Isaiah 53:11 He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many… I. THE TRAVAIL OF HIS SOUL. Think of the travail of our Lord's soul between Bethlehem and Calvary. 1. The travail of waiting during the long years of the life at Nazareth, during the tedious process of training the disciples that followed (Luke 12:50). 2. The travail of His own personal temptation, in the solitude of the wilderness, the protests of Peter, the impulses and the spiritual aloofness of the multitudes, and the actual hostility of their leaders (John 1:11). 3. Omitting many other particulars, the travail of Gethsemane and the cry upon the cross (Matthew 27:46). 4. The travail with sin. "Upon Him was laid the iniquity of us all" A pure spirit is alway pained, even at the sight of meanness or vice. Christ's spirit was so pure that Satan could find nothing in Him (John 14:30); and yet in the loneliness of the passion He suffered the penalty of sins not His own, wrestled with them in prolonged, triumphed over them for ever on the Cross. And if the travail of His soul be measured by the distance between His holiness and the guilt with which He consented to be charged, it will be seen to be absolutely without parallel in human history. II. THIS TRAVAIL, SO IT IS SOMETIMES STATED, HAS PROVED SHEER WASTE, or at least, has not accomplished, and is not likely to accomplish, anything like what Christ in enduring it expected. 1. "Christianity a failure has been the theme of many a critic of our faith; and the failure has been alleged to occur in almost every department of thought and morals and mission. It must be confessed that Christianity has not yet succeeded completely anywhere. Even in places where it has had on its side almost every possible advantage — been supported by governments, illustrated by every kind of genius, in control of the influences of education and public opinion — it has not made society quite pure, or even the average character of its own agents and adherents faultless. And at present there is no part of the earth upon which the Saviour can be imagined to look and to be satisfied with what He sees. The complaint sometimes takes a more personal form. Every Christian is occasionally tempted to think that religion is proving for himself personally something of a failure. After years of sincere trust and service, there are faults of temper, elements of discontent and self-seeking and sin present in the nature, and often apparently even supreme there. And instead of imagining that our Saviour is satisfied with us, the disposition is rather to imagine that we can never satisfy Him, never become "perfect" and matured, but that we shall have to go on stumbling and faulty to the end. 2. There are two obvious modes of dealing with these complaints and suspicions. It would be possible to plead the intractability of the material, and to imitate natural science in her ceaseless demand for time. Or, we may place ourselves with this prophet at the ultimate end of our Lord's career, and see whether there are not, in society and in the heart of man, processes of progress that are tending to success. The conclusion will probably be that the success of Christianity, in relation to everything that concerns morality and religion, has already been so great as even to guarantee the eventual satisfaction concerning which this verse speaks. (1) In regard to the thoughts, which in reasoning men must underlie and to some extent determine their practice. Think what an incalculable improvement Christianity has effected in the prevalent conception of God. From these new thoughts of God the early Christians deduced their conclusions as to the infusion of a Divine element into the spirit of man, by means of which he may be lifted up to God. (2) In matters of social progress and the amelioration of the race, is Christianity a failure? The more personal suspicion, that religion is proving a failure as far as we ourselves are concerned, is a natural fear, due sometimes to the ease with which our best aspirations are forgotten, sometimes to the weight of this "body of sin." But it is impossible to imagine the Saviour, now "expecting until His enemies be made His footstool," ever turning to His Father in tones of protest, "After My travail and death, is this penitent sinner to be rejected? this man, struggling with the sin within him and about him, to be worsted?" Did He not once actually say to His Father, thereby pledging both to pardon and help us, "For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth? And therefore as certain as the Cross of Christ are the pardon of every worst sinner who comes to God through Him, and the perfecting of every believer who with inflexible purpose cleaves in devotion to Him. This word "satisfied" again, in its Scriptural use, suggests as much. Almost the only place where a man is spoken of as being really satisfied with what he perceives himself to be is in one of the psalms, and even there it is an emotion that is not reached until after death: "When I awake, I shall be satisfied with Thy likeness." It seems to imply that, as long as a man lives, he will have some fault to find with himself, weakness or immaturity or aptitude to sin. But, clinging to his Saviour when he dies, all these miseries will fall away from him, and at last the sinner and the Saviour will be satisfied. (Prof. R. W. Moss, D.D.) Parallel Verses KJV: He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. |
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