I was deeply moved as I read this passage this morning:
He was despised and rejected—
a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief.
We turned our backs on him and looked the other way.
He was despised, and we did not care.Yet it was our weaknesses he carried;
it was our sorrows that weighed him down.
And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God,
a punishment for his own sins!
But he was pierced for our rebellion,
crushed for our sins.
He was beaten so we could be whole.
He was whipped so we could be healed.
All of us, like sheep, have strayed away.
We have left God’s paths to follow our own.
Yet the Lord laid on him
the sins of us all.
I don’t think that there is any more beautiful, heartbreaking or relevant passage in scripture to describe Jesus. It brings me to my knees in sorrow – and in gratitude. But the “reflection” in the title of this post isn’t about my own reflection … it’s the reflection in Isaiah’s “mirror” as he wrote this – some 700 years before Christ was born. How amazing and remarkable that Jesus’ coming was such an event – such a globally seismic change – that its ripples and echoes were felt not only after he came … but before he came as well.
Passage from Isaiah 53:3-6 (New Living Translation)
Finding Approval 