"But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed." - Isaiah 53:5
In one short little verse, God says that transgressions, iniquities, punishment, and the need for healing are the things that belong to us. And in that same verse, God says that there is one who will be pierced and crushed for us in order to bring us the peace and healing we need.
How might we understand this?
I remember consciously thinking and telling people how I'd never had one stitch in my first eleven years of life. And then in the next ten years, it was like it was inevitable, and I got more stitches than, as they say, you could shake a stick at: a surgery in my midsection, another surgery in my midsection, a huge gash in my left shin from jumping a fence, another gash in my thigh from falling out of a tree, surgery on a badly broken ankle, surgery on a badly broken cheek and jaw, multiple broken noses, multiple broken ribs, stitches over my right eye, then my left, and then my right again, and a feeling that stitches and I just were born for each other.
I became so thankful for a mother who bandaged, a father who provided medical insurance, and doctors and nurses who knew how to stitch up my accidental, but still real wounds.
And so it is with sin and the need for a healer of the soul.
We might have a run where we feel really good about our thoughts, our decisions, and our actions; ya know, we feel like we're good people, and we've got this sin thing conquered.
But it's inevitable! Spiritually speaking, here comes a punch in the gut, a kick in the shins, the jumping of a boundary fence that plainly said "stay out", a falling from our high horse, a broken heart, various other wounds to our pride, a plank in our right eye, a splinter in our left, and then a poke in the right eye again, and an overall feeling that the need for spiritual stitches and us were just born for each other.
Ever since the first man and woman, way back at the beginning, used their God-given freedom to think and decide and act in ways that wounded their relationship with God, all us people are all under this condition called "depravity," which means both that we're totally helpless to avoid sinning and also that we're certainly helpless to stitch up and heal our soul and our God relationship. It is the human condition. It is inescapable. We can't get out of our own way. We are sinners to the core. And it is good for us not to deny but to understand ourselves as sinners in this way because Jesus himself said in Matthew 9:12, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick."
To deny our sinfulness is to deny our need for a healer.
And, boy oh boy, do we need a healer. Maybe not for a season when you're feeling good about how good you are and how good you're doing and how good things are going.
But it's inevitable and inescapable that we will see the truth plainly again.
We need a Healer for our every wound.
And that's just what we have in Jesus Christ and the wounds he bore unto death on the cross.
"But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed." - Isaiah 53:5
Praise God!
Pastor Chris
"The gospel is the story of Jesus [what God's only Son has done for us that we can't do for ourselves], spoken as a promise." - Robert Jenson
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