Scripture Reading: Isa. 53:3-6, 9, 12; Psa. 103:1-5
Ⅹ
Christ was a man of sorrows (lit., pains), despised and forsaken of men— Isa. 53:3; Psa. 22:6-7; Luke 22:28; 23:11; Matt. 27:39; John 1:10-13:
A
Christ was a "man whose chief distinction was, that His life was one of constant painful endurance" (Keil and Delitzch)—cf. 2 Thes. 3:5; Rev. 2:10b.
B
As the complete God, signified by the arm of Jehovah as the power of God, Christ became a perfect man, signified by a man of sorrows, in His incarnation— Isa. 53:1; 51:9; 1 Cor. 1:22-24; John 11:35.
C
Christ's unique enjoyment was the Father and the Father's will as His supply— Isa. 7:14-15; John 4:34; 5:17; 17:4; Eph. 4:20-21.
D
We need to know Christ in the fellowship of His sufferings for the building up of His Body—Phil. 3:10; Col. 1:24; Matt. 11:20, 25-30; Isa. 42:4.
E
Even though our outer man is decaying, our inner man is being renewed day by day; in the world we have affliction, but in Christ we have peace, and the ruler of this world cannot touch us—2 Cor. 4:16; John 16:33; 14:30; 1 John 5:4, 18.
Ⅺ
Christ was the One who was executed with two criminals—Isa. 53:12, 9a; Luke 23:32-33:
A
The first person saved by Christ through His crucifixion was not a gentleman but a criminal, a robber, sentenced to death; this is very meaningful—Matt. 27:38; Luke 23:42-43.
B
A proof that our vital group is prevailing is that we love people without any discrimination—Matt. 9:11-13.
C
We have been regenerated to be God's species, God's kind; this means that we do not merely love others but that we are love itself; God does not want us to love with our natural love but with Him as our love—1 John 4:8, 19.
D
God loves the fallen human race, who had become His enemies, by causing His sun (signifying Christ) to rise on the evil and the good indiscriminately and sending rain (signifying the Spirit) on the just and the unjust equally; thus, we may become the sons of the heavenly Father who are sanctified from the tax collectors and the Gentiles—Matt. 5:43-48.
Ⅻ
Christ was the One "wounded because of our transgressions; / He was crushed because of our iniquities; / The chastening for our peace was upon Him, / And by His stripes we have been healed"—Isa. 53:5:
A
Christ is the One who has borne our sicknesses and carried our sorrows on the cross—v. 4; Matt. 8:17; Psa. 103:1-5:
１
"Bless [speak well of; praise with adoration] Jehovah, O my soul; / And do not forget all His benefits: / He pardons all your iniquities; / He heals all your diseases"—vv. 2-3.
２
Sicknesses and sorrows, like transgressions and iniquities, come from sin; hence, they too need Christ's redemption—Isa. 53:5; Matt. 8:17.
B
First Peter 2:24 says that we have been healed by Christ's bruise; Christ's suffering of death healed our death so that we may live in His resurrection:
１
By bruising the enemy on the head and by allowing the enemy to bruise Him on His heel (Gen. 3:15; Psa. 22:16), we are healed (Heb. 2:14; 1 John 3:8).
２
Now that Christ has healed our death to make us alive, we live always with the intention and inclination toward righteousness because of the life of Christ within us; the life-giving Spirit is working within us continually to carry out the subjective aspect of the cross in our being—1 Pet. 2:24; 1 Cor. 15:45b.
３
Christ is the Shepherd and Overseer of our souls, guiding us to walk according to the spirit on the paths of righteousness—1 Pet. 2:25; Rom. 8:4; Psa. 23:3.
４
As we experience the cross and live a crucified life, Christ's resurrection life becomes our healing power, and the Lord becomes our healing life to heal our bitter situations and the bitterness in our being—Exo. 15:22-26.
C
By enjoying the crucified Christ as the life-giving Spirit—the power and wisdom of God to us—all the problems in our daily life and church life are solved—1 Cor. 1:24, 30; 2:2; 15:45b.
XIII
Christ was the One who poured out His soul unto death; this was His pouring out of His blood of the covenant—Isa. 53:12; Phil. 2:8; Mark 14:24:
A
The blood of the covenant ushers us into God's presence, into God Himself, into the full enjoyment of God in the Holy of Holies by beholding God, eating God, and drinking God—Exo. 24:8-11; Heb. 8:10-12; 10:19-20; Rev. 22:1-2, 14, 17.
B
"The life [the soul]…is in the blood" (Lev. 17:11, 14); when Christ's incorruptible blood was poured out, everything of the soul-life, the natural life, was poured out; the pouring out of the blood is the removing of everything natural (everything that we obtained and that came by our birth—John 3:6).
C
We can be selfless because Christ poured out our self when He poured out His blood—this is the "I" who was crucified with Christ; now the "I" in whom Christ lives can live by the faith of the Son of God—Gal. 2:20.
D
Christ not only died for us, but He also died as us—when He died, we died; when He was buried, resurrected, and ascended, we were buried, resurrected, and ascended—vv. 19-20; Rom. 6:3-5; Eph. 2:5-6; Hymns, #483, stanza 1.
E
We have to continually stand on this fact and exercise our spirit to walk by the self-denying and crucifying Spirit—Phil. 1:19-21; Gal. 5:16, 24-26.
F
The love of Christ constrains us because One died for all (Christ as our Substitute); therefore, all died (in Christ as our grafted life); this is so that we might no longer live to ourselves but to Him who died for us and has been raised— 2 Cor. 5:14-15; Gal. 2:19-20.
XIV
Christ was the One on whom Jehovah laid our iniquity and who bore our iniquities and was made sin for us—Isa. 53:6, 11-12; 1 Pet. 2:24; 1 Cor. 15:3; Heb. 9:28; 2 Cor. 5:21:
A
God cannot forgive sinful people without meeting the demands of His righteousness (Psa. 103:6-7); according to His righteousness, "the soul who sins, he shall die" (Ezek. 18:4), and "the wages of sin is death" (Rom. 6:23):
１
Christ, the righteous One, was judged on behalf of us, the unrighteous, by the righteous God according to His righteousness so that He might remove the barrier of our sins and bring us to God—1 Pet. 3:18.
２
On the cross Jesus was made sin for us, condemned sin in the flesh, and by dying on our behalf fulfilled all God's righteousness; now for the sake of His righteousness, God must forgive us—2 Cor. 5:21; Rom. 8:3; 1 John 1:9.
B
Christ volunteered to be an offering for sin, referring to an offering for sin in its totality—Isa. 53:10; John 1:29; 1 John 1:8-9.
C
By laying our hands on Christ as our offering, we are joined to Him, and He and we become one; in such a union all our weaknesses, defects, and faults are taken on by Him, and all His virtues become ours—Lev. 1:4a:
１
Taking Christ as our trespass offering with the confession of our sins in the divine light is the way to drink Christ as the living water for us to become the New Jerusalem—1 John 1:8-9; John 4:14-18.
２
Taking Christ as our trespass offering with the confession of our sins is the way to keep ourselves in the fellowship of life for our growth in life unto the maturity in life—1 John 1:2-3, 5-9; Acts 24:16.
３
Taking Christ as our trespass offering to receive the forgiveness of sins issues in our fearing God and loving God—Psa. 130:4; Luke 7:47-50.
D
Ministering Christ as the sin-dealing life to the saints kills the germs, destroys the problems, and maintains the oneness of the Spirit—John 8:10-12; 1 John 5:16; Rom. 2:4b; Lev. 10:17; Gal. 6:1.
XV
Christ was the One of whose bones not one was broken; this is typified in Exodus 12:46, prophesied in Psalm 34:20, and fulfilled in John 19:32-36:
A
The children of Israel were not to break any bones of the passover lamb; when the Lord Jesus was crucified, His bones were not broken—Exo. 12:46; John 19:33, 36.
B
Christ's unbroken bone signifies His unbreakable, indestructible eternal life that imparts His life into us—Gen. 2:21-23; Heb. 7:16; 2 Cor. 3:6; 1 Cor. 15:45b:
１
The rib, the bone, taken out of Adam's side signifies the resurrection life, and God built a woman with the rib of Adam; now God builds up the church with the resurrection life of Christ—Eph. 5:25-27.
２
Just as Eve was a part of Adam, so the church is a part of Christ; just as Adam and Eve were called "Adam," Christ and the church are called "the Christ"—vv. 30-32; Gen. 5:2; 1 Cor. 12:12.
３
Just as Adam and Eve were one flesh, Christ and the church are one spirit—Eph. 5:30-32; 1 Cor. 6:17.
４
Christ's unbreakable and indestructible eternal life that imparts life to us builds us up to be the ultimate Eve—the New Jerusalem.