December 9, 2001

Isaiah 42:1-7

A Servant to Meet Our Greatest Needs

  1. Introduction
    1. Illustration – Tennis star Arthur Ashe once said, True heroism is remarkably sober, very undramatic. It is not the urge to surpass all others at whatever cost, but the urge to serve others at whatever cost.
    2. Context – You know what? Ashe got it right. Serving others no matter what the cost is a part of true heroism. The prophet Isaiah wrote about a true hero, a servant of God. This servant is described by God in Isaiah 42:1-7. Let’s take a look at what God has to say in this passage about His servant.
  1. Scripture Passage
    1. Isaiah 42:1-7 – "Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him and he will bring justice to the nations. 2 He will not shout or cry out, or raise his voice in the streets. 3 A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. In faithfulness he will bring forth justice; 4 he will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth. In his law the islands will put their hope." 5 This is what God the LORD says—he who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and all that comes out of it, who gives breath to its people, and life to those who walk on it: 6 "I, the LORD, have called you in righteousness; I will take hold of your hand. I will keep you and will make you to be a covenant for the people and a light for the Gentiles, 7 to open eyes that are blind, to free captives from prison and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness."
    2. God says some pretty great things about His servant. We’re going to spend some time this morning taking a look at Who God’s servant is and what this servant can mean to us.
  1. A Gentle Servant
    1. God identifies the servant as belonging to Him, as chosen by Him, as being upheld by Him. In Old Testament language, that’s the same thing as saying that God’s servant comes with God’s power and authority. The servant will act on behalf of God and speak the words of God with the same level of effectiveness as God. The servant Isaiah wrote about is God’s handpicked man for doing His will. God’s servant is empowered by God’s Spirit. That’s how he is able to act with God’s power and authority.
    2. Now it’s really easy to look at the next few phrases and interpret them as meaning that God’s servant is intended to come and bring His judgment. But that’s not what they mean at all. When God says, he will bring justice to the nations, He means that His servant will establish righteousness as the norm in the way the world operates. A righteous world order will mean that all the people will benefit. God’s servant bringing justice to the nations is a good thing, and it’s something we should all long for.
    3. God’s servant isn’t coming to bring war. In the Old Testament, this image of shouting or crying out or raising the voice in the streets is used to describe the chaos brought by war. Picture it in your mind – the city walls have been breached, enemies are pouring in through the holes, captains are shouting instructions to soldiers, citizens are crying out in terror. That isn’t what God’s servant is all about. God’s servant is a man of peace. A man who brings peace. A gentle man.
    4. God makes special effort to highlight His servant’s gentleness. A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. The servant hasn’t come to finish off the weak, but to heal them. As my study Bible commentator puts it, The servant will mend broken lives. I like that a lot. Lots of times good folks go through times when they are just barely hanging on. Sometimes they’ve been blindsided by something unexpected. Sometimes it’s just an accumulation over time of stuff that suddenly becomes overwhelming. They’ve been bruised near the breaking point, and their flame is just about out. The servant doesn't bring a rod to beat them with or a hose to put out the fire. God’s servant is gentle, gentle enough to mend their lives and heal their hearts.
    5. The servant is faithful enough to God and His purposes to make the righteous world order happen in God’s time. The servant’s not going to stumble along blindly trying to do God’s purposes, and he’s not going to become so overwhelmed with discouragement that he gives up. Because the servant is empowered and faithful, in his law the islands with put their hope. I think it’s significant that God uses "islands" instead of nations. Islands are vulnerable. They are vulnerable to the weather; they are vulnerable to invasion. Any army with enough transport ships can take them over. Any powerful enough storm can wipe out everything on islands. But because of the faithfulness and gentleness and power of God’s servant, the islands and everyone else can bank on His words. The hope of all the islands can be strongly anchored into the solid rock of the words of God and His servant.
    6. Illustration - John Ortberg, in The Life You've Always Wanted, wrote, Some years ago, when I was in Ethiopia, I learned about ... a 99-year-old woman who lived about two hours outside Addis Ababa, the capital city. This woman had become a follower of Christ in middle age, and she was both blind and illiterate. She lived in a little hut, where she kept two Bibles on her table - one in Amharic (the official language of Ethiopia), one in English. Whenever someone came to visit her, she would ask the person to read. Over time, her favorite passages became so familiar that she could recite them from memory, and if her visitors couldn't read, she would recite as a kind of gift to them. People would come from far away just to visit her. Why would they make the journey for an elderly, illiterate, blind widow? Because somehow in her presence, through her voice, the words "The Lord is my shepherd" ceased to be just words. Those thoughts had washed over her mind so deeply, so often, that there was simply no way that anxiety-producing thoughts could survive. In purity of heart, she willed one thing. People flocked to her because it was impossible to hear her say those words without being filled with the hope that perhaps one day they would be as real to them as they were to her. "In his law the islands will put their hope." This widow anchored her life in God’s words. And because of this, she had hope.
  1. The Life-giving Servant
    1. An interesting thing happens in the passage right now – God gives His credentials. Considering that this book is written to the Israelites, it is pretty remarkable that God has to reinforce Who He is to get His point across. But that’s what He does. He gives them, and us, exactly the words that they, and we, need to hear.
    2. God says this is Who He is. He is the Creator of the heavens and earth and everything in them. He gives breath and life to everyone on earth. That’s Who God is – the Creator and Sustainer of life. But then God gives a very important message to His servant. God tells His servant that He has called His servant in His righteousness, as a part of His character. God will keep His servant from stumbling and hold him steady no matter what hits him. God will sustain His servant and make His servant a living example of His covenant for all the Israelites. God will make His servant a light, cutting through the darkness of sin and sorrow, for the Gentiles, the non-Jewish peoples. God’s servant will open eyes that are physically blind and those that are spiritually blind. God’s servant will free those who are in spiritual bondage. God’s servant will release from the lowest and darkest pits those who are in spiritual bondage. God has called His servant to do all these things.
    3. Illustration – Homiletics online tells this story: An attempted jailbreak in Okanogan, Washington, was foiled when the two inmates trying to escape during the night made so much noise chipping through an eight-inch concrete wall that other prisoners complained to guards, who caught the men in a crawl space. Sheriff Jim Weed said that if the men had been able to chip through the outside wall, they would have found themselves 80 feet above the ground. Too often people try to find their own way out of the spiritual and emotional prisons they find themselves in, only to find themselves in worse shape than they were to start with. They would be a lot better off letting God’s servant do it for them. But Who exactly is God’s servant described in Isaiah’s writings?
  1. God’s Servant Has a Name
    1. God’s servant, the one who God has called and brought to do all these things, has a name. His name is Jesus. Jesus came and lived among us to show the power of God here on earth. And He suffered and died to break the chains of spiritual bondage that keep us from God. Jesus is the servant of God Whom Isaiah foretold hundreds of years before His birth. Jesus is bringing all that God said into being even as we speak. Jesus, God’s Son, is the Servant who has come to set us free.
    2. You know what the best thing about what Isaiah recorded about Jesus is? All this stuff we’ve been looking at didn’t apply only to those who were alive when Jesus walked this earth. Jesus came to do all this stuff for us! That is the best news we could ever hear! Look at verse three – A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. Jesus didn’t come to nail us for being weak – He came to heal the bruised reeds and to re-light the almost-out flames of the wounded and hurting. When we are barely hanging on, because we’ve been blindsided or because the accumulation of life has nailed us, Jesus is the One who will gently pick us up and mend our broken lives. Even if our lives have been broken by sin, He will heal them. Jesus came to heal and mend the bruised and nearly extinguished among us. Jesus came to heal us.
    3. I know that personally. I’ve been going through some tough times lately. The accumulation of lots of stuff past and present has hit me hard, and I’ve felt like I’ve been hanging on by my fingernails. But Tuesday, through the words of a fellow pastor in our conference, Jesus began to heal those hurts. He began to dig through that accumulation and just love on me. I’ve been the bruised reed and smoldering wick He could have just wiped out very easily. He could have gotten down on me because I’m supposed to know better than to let things accumulate like that. He could have nailed me because I’m supposed to be strong. He could have crushed me because I’m not perfect like He wants be to become. He didn’t. He allowed me to see that He loves me no matter what. He allowed me to see that His calling on my life is a gift from Him. He allowed me to see that He isn’t going to let go of me. He allowed me to see that the process of transformation and healing He began in my life is going to continue, on His schedule, and that it’s okay for me not to be perfect. But most of all, He showed me that He loves me. And I want to say to you that all of this applies to all of you. God will do the same for you. Some of you He has already begun this process in. Some of you haven’t allowed Him to start yet. Healing is a process. Wouldn’t it be a smart idea for all of us to allow Him to start it?
    4. You know what? Jesus isn’t just our Healer – He’s also our Hope. He is the only constant in a world that is continually changing, that is continually making choices for evil until He comes again to establish His righteous world order. Our hope in Him is rock solid against the raging seas of life. I know that more than anything else in life Jesus is my hope. He’s the only One Who has kept me alive and kept me moving toward Him my whole life. Even when I didn’t know Him, He was moving me toward Him. He is my only hope. He is our only hope.
    5. A really cool part is next. Probably the coolest part of the whole passage. Jesus is our covenant with God. When a person makes a covenant, they are saying that they will sacrifice their life rather than break the commitment they have made. So God is identifying Jesus as the One Who sacrificed His life to fulfill God’s covenant. Jesus is a light to the Gentiles. Guess what? We are Gentiles. Those of us in this room who are not Jewish are Gentiles. So Jesus is our spiritual light in the midst of incredible spiritual darkness. He is our path to God. He is the only way we can have a close personal relationship with our Creator. Jesus came to open our blind spiritual eyes to what we’ve been missing – that loving relationship with our God. Jesus came to free us from the bondage of sin and darkness that has us wrapped up so tightly we can hardly move. Jesus came to free us from the deep and dark spiritual pit we settle for. Jesus came to heal us – sometimes physically, but always spiritually and emotionally. Jesus came to heal us. Will we accept His gift?
    6. Illustration - Joan Chittister, in The Rule of Benedict, writes, There is the story of a man who came to a holy person seeking healing. The holy person listened patiently as the man listed his complaints and then asked, "Do you really want to be cured?" The man was shocked by the question and said, "Of course I want to be cured. Why else would I have come?" To which the holy person replied, "Most come, not to be cured, that is too painful. They come for relief." Do you merely want relief, which is impossible to find? Or do you want to receive Jesus’ gift of healing? It’s up to you to choose.
  1. Conclusion
    1. Wesley Taylor writes, Personal transformation. Sometimes the solution to moral and spiritual improvement is not all that complicated. An auto mechanic received a repair order that said to check a clunking noise when going around corners. So he took the car out for a test drive and made two right turns, and each time – sure enough – he heard a loud clunking noise. Back at the shop, he returned the car to the service manager with this note: "Removed bowling ball from trunk." What bowling ball does Jesus want to remove from the trunk of your life? Do you need Him to take that one step to begin the process of healing and release from bondage in your life? What areas of your life keep you in bondage? Jesus is offering you the opportunity to take the first step to healing and freedom right now. Again, it’s up to you what you will chose to do.
    2. If you’ve been listening to the Holy Spirit speaking to you, and you need to allow Him to begin the process of healing and release in your heart and life right now, please come forward. Don’t do what I did and wait until I was almost blown away. Come forward and be prayed for right now.
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