Our Suffering Savior and Risen Lord

The Jews had been waiting for their Messiah for generations. They had the scriptures that pointed them in the right direction. They had their traditions and law that they assumed brought them close to God. They had everything they needed to be able to see when their Messiah came, but they were not expecting Jesus. He did not fit their mold. He did not look like the Messiah that they had envisioned, and so they did everything they could to stop Him.

Approximately 700 years before the events of Holy Week, Good Friday, and Easter weekend ever took place; Isaiah sat and wrote of the Messiah. He wrote then (Isaiah 53:1-11) of how the Messiah would not be recognized by the very people that had been looking for Him. He would be the One, but they would consider Him as someone rejected by God, and that is exactly what happened. Jesus did nothing, other than fulfill His role, and yet on this fateful day nearly 2000 years ago, He was hung on a cross and left for dead.

As I sit and think on that day, the day that the one I call Savior hung on that cross, my minds’ eye paints it as a dark and dreary day, a day to be mourned, a day that you wish would have never had to happen. After having seen Mel Gibson’s movie, The Passion of the Christ, the image of a beaten, broken, and bloody Jesus hanging from the nails on a rugged cross has been etched into my mind. How it hurts to see Him this way, and know that it was for us that He endured this agony. What a terrible moment it must have been as those who knew Him heard Him say, “It is finished” and saw His head fall over as He died.

Today, while the images can be painted vividly in our mind, we do have the advantage of being able to see what came next. Jesus Christ did die. He became exactly what Isaiah had prophesied. He was pierced for our transgression and crushed for our iniquities. He is our suffering Savior, the Messiah. However, the story did not end there. That was just one stop along the way. Soon, the tomb would be found empty, because He has risen. He is our suffering savior and is now our risen Lord!