Wounds and bruises

Wednesday 26 May 2021

Wounds and bruises

They persecute the one you strike. Psalm 69:27

The prophets and Moses foretold that Christ would be subject to suffering (Acts 26:23). Through Psalm 69 we learn of the various sufferings that Jesus endured from those who hated him, even as he suffered the chastisement of God. For God subjects his Son to suffering (Isaiah 53:10) and allows men to lay hands on him.

Although Jesus is found innocent of any crime by Pilate, men no longer know any restraint. They scourge him without mercy, causing him wounds foretold prophetically : I presented my back to those who struck me and my cheeks to those who plucked my beard (Isaiah 50:6) ; Plowmen plowed my back, they made long furrows in it (Psalm 129:3). The Gospels give the details : hit in the face, whipped, his hands and feet nailed to the cross. How much suffering, how much pain represents each of these wounds endured in silence (Isaiah 53:7) !

And yet, however cruel and revolting these outrages may be, none of the wounds received from men can save anyone. Only the stripes inflicted by God have the power and virtue necessary to heal man from sin and wash him from his sins. This is what the apostle Peter teaches : Christ suffered for you... he who did not sin, and in whose mouth fraud was not found... bore our sins. in his body on the tree... by whose stripe you were healed (1 Peter 2:21-24 ; see also Isaiah 53:5). It is during the last three long hours of the torture of the cross that Jesus endures the curse (Deuteronomy 21:23), that he knows the abandonment of God (Matthew 27:46), that he is made sin for us (2 Corinthians 5:21). He suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous (1 Peter 3:18).

The painful part of Jesus was being hurt for our transgressions... bruised for our iniquities ; the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and by his stripes we were healed (Isaiah 53:5).

Source (Pleasing the Lord)