He Was Pierced

Reflection

Seven centuries before the cross, Isaiah describes a suffering servant with unsettling precision. "He was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities." The striking thing is the direction of the suffering. The servant does not suffer for his own wrongs. He suffers for ours. Our transgressions, our iniquities, our brokenness are laid upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. This is the heart of what Christians mean by atonement. We often imagine that if God is to deal with human sin, he must either overlook it (which would not be just) or punish us (which would leave us lost). Isaiah points to a third way we could never have invented: God takes the weight himself. The servant stands in our place. Verse 6 gives the most honest diagnosis of the human condition: "All of us like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, each one, to his own way." Not just the obviously wicked — all of us. Each of us has wandered off down a path of our own choosing. And "the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on him." When you look at the cross, you are not watching a tragedy that happened to Jesus. You are watching the deliberate love of God bearing what belonged to you. The wounds are his; the healing is yours.