NOTES for Isa 52:15

The lines of the prophet Isaiah make it terrifyingly clear that Jesus was tormented though innocent, voluntarily going to His death. In those rare moments when we draw near this mystery, the heart is pierced by pain at the injustice done to the Innocent One and at His meekness in willingly giving Himself. He went to the most terrible death known to humanity for our sake—for all people—those who have lived on earth and those yet to be born. And the most terrible—and the most beautiful—thing is that I am among these people... For my sake He endured these sufferings, to redeem my sin by His sacrifice, and through this He grants life, because He “became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him” (Hebrews 5:9).

Of all the prophets, the image of the suffering Messiah appears only in Babylonian Isaiah. To his contemporaries these words sounded strange: for them the image of the Messiah was least of all associated with any kind of suffering. For them the Messiah was a righteous King, who would live like a king. What suffering could there be?

Meanwhile, in the prophet's words there sounds a revelation concerning the fundamental laws of spiritual life. After all, he does not say by accident that the Messiah suffers not for His own sins, but for the sins of other people, for the sins of the whole people of God. And He suffers voluntarily. This means that the Messiah takes upon Himself responsibility for the people's sins, somewhat as even today one person can repay another person's debts by paying his creditors for him. True, when a crime is involved, the transfer of responsibility to another person is impossible in our day. Today each person answers for himself before the law. But in ancient times it was possible to stand surety even for a criminal, taking upon oneself responsibility for the crime he had committed and bearing the corresponding punishment. In such a case it was presumed that the surety knew well the one for whom he was vouching and was so confident in him that he was ready to free him from the consequences of what had been done. The surety's motives did not matter here. He was required only to take upon himself the consequences of the crime committed by the offender.

This is exactly what the Messiah does before God in Isaiah: He takes upon Himself responsibility for the sins committed by the people and bears all the consequences of those sins. After this, the people are freed from responsibility and receive a chance to begin a new life from a clean slate. This was the only chance, because one cannot enter the Kingdom together with the burden of the consequences produced by sin committed consciously and voluntarily, and there were many such sins in the history of the people. Someone had to take them upon himself, giving the rest the possibility of entering the Kingdom unburdened by a load too heavy for new life. And the Messiah does this just as voluntarily and consciously as the people once sinned quite consciously and voluntarily, thereby opening the road to the Kingdom for the people and becoming the Redeemer.