A lot of stories carry this element: the protagonist goes quiet because he has to. For instance, in the closing scene of the movie “Gladiator,” Maximus is lethally stabbed just before he fights the emperor. But he’s gotta keep his mouth shut; he can’t let anyone know that’s happened. Otherwise, he’ll mis the chance to fight and try to kill the emperor.
This necessary muteness is highlighted in our passage. V. 7: He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. Through repetition, Isaiah draws attention to the silence of the Servant throughout his ordeal. The silence in His suffering is a feature of our Lord’s heroism. How so? It emphasizes that Jesus brought on His suffering instead of trying to talk His way out of it. Jesus wanted the thing that could only be accomplished through the offering of Himself, and that demanded silence.
Opened not his mouth – Man, that’s really hard to do! To not explain yourself, even while the stress mounts higher. Through our silence to invite others’ misunderstanding…or worse, apathy! That’s what Isaiah points to in v.8: As for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? Among Jesus’ contemporaries, who bothered to think that this cutting off might be necessary? And of course, the answer was: No One.
Jesus – tell them what’s really going down! Show them who they’re dealing with!
Nope. Rather, v. 4 says: we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. People were almost completely mistaken in what was happening to Jesus. They figured some Divine come-uppance must be happening.
If they had known who was in their grasp, they wouldn’t have crucified the glorious Lord. So… He didn’t tell them. The lamb is silent before the slaughter because it doesn’t understand what’s happening to him. Because He does understand, the Servant is silent as a lamb.
Well, if we’ve lived a few years, we too know something about being misunderstood. Probably in some moments we’ve also experienced the frustration of having to hold our own counsel, not being able to express what is most important to us. The feeling of isolation…even alienation.
Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. In highlighting in this poem something so familiar to us, isn’t Isaiah signaling that our experience of alienation is some of the grief that Jesus carried?
Where does alienation come from…this talking past one another, this failing to grasp the things that are dearest and nearest to each other, even the necessity sometimes of not communicating the things that press most heavily on our hearts? Why do we feel so distant from people, sometimes so alone?
And, of course, the Christian story is that things have long been so… but weren’t always so. We have on record the time when man and woman were naked before each other! That is, in Eden, humans were an open book to each other. There were no lies, no secrets, no hidden agendas, no suspicions, no browser history resetting, no shame, no guilt. Instead, openness. Candor. Partnership. Fellowship. Understanding. Sympathy.
Man and woman, in other words, once were worthy reflections of the Community that is the Triune God: this eternal fellowship and mutuality and joy and love between Father and Son in the bond of the Spirit. Perfect communication and interest and respect.
Ahh!
We don’t have to dwell long on what happened. Just to say that humans violated trust with God – that’s the force of the word transgression. A huge hole pierced the relationship of Creator and Image Bearer.
Then into that broken relationship came a whole nest of iniquities that crushed us: more and more distortions about who God is, what He requires of us, how we’ll honor those requirements. In our imagination turned crooked, we turned from the Triune God to other gods, often creatures of property and appetite, not realizing that behind these idolatries there waited demonic Powers to further injure us.
And, of course, under the fracture of that primary relationship, all other relationships start to crack. We don’t connect, sufficiently, with our parents, or our children, or our neighbors, or our countrymen. Especially our spouse. We don’t even understand ourselves.
How pathetic was our choice to break trust with God! Whatever excitement we might have gained in breaking trust with the God we were supposed to reflect we’ve paid for in a loss of peace.
Here’s how the Book of Common Prayer sums up things in the wake of the Big Fracture: We have left undone those things which we ought to have done; And we have done those things which we ought not to have done; And there is no health in us.
Brothers and Sisters: I do love the oratorio called Messiah and I’m in awe of Handel’s insights contained therein. I know nothing else is inspired like the Bible, but I’d say that the Messiah is the next level below. Anyway, two things from song #24: Sur-e-ly. Sur-e-ly. This word begins a soberly triumphant chorus. Notice Handel expanded the word into three syllables instead of the two. And he chose to repeat the word. All to make the point, that however incredible it seems, THIS HAPPENED.
What happened? About 90 seconds into song #24, when the chorus sings, He was bruised for our iniquities: the tenors belt out the our a half step higher, and somehow that imbues the note with…amazement.
Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.
In the suffering that ends in bloodshed and the death of the Eternal Son, we the image bearers find atonement for our transgressions and our iniquities are condemned… in His flesh. We are reconciled to God. Come to a permanent peace with Him. On that day when Jesus was pierced, in Jerusalem began to flow living water out from a living Temple. It washes over us and we are…healed.
And now, having been washed, we’re even better than before the great fracture: now we can reflect into the world and into all our relationships a truth about God that perhaps we’d never know apart from this saga of sin and salvation: The Triune God: a Community of mercy and compassion and forgiveness.
Thank you, Jesus, for suffering in our place, quietly.
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