Isaiah
50:4-9a- In the Old
Testament lesson God’s servant suffers willingly because of his trust in God.
God’s servant faces suffering confident of God’s help. The suffering of the Messiah was not only
physical but also mental and emotional. This may be a worse form of hurt – hurt
feelings. The Servant as a faithful follower of God endures shameful treatment.
His enemies pull out his beard and spit in His face. Jesus endures this form of
suffering: the soldiers dressed him as a king, the superscription above His
head, crucified between two criminals, exposed naked before a crowd, taunted
and mocked: “If you are the Son of God…”
“The Lord Yahweh has given me the tongue of
those who are taught (a disciple or learned person), that I may know how to sustain with words him who is weary “(v.
4a). This is the voice of the Servant—in this instance, apparently the prophet.
It can hardly be the nation Israel here, because it is Israel who is weary and needs
sustaining. Also, these verses describe a kind of faithful discipleship that
does not describe Israel in this time.
The phrase,
“The Lord Yahweh” four times in these
verses (vv. 4, 5, 7, 9). In each instance, the Lord God enables the
Servant—”has given me a tongue” (v. 4), “has
opened my ear” (v. 5), “will help me”
(v. 7), “will help me” (v. 9). Not
only does “the Lord Yahweh” empower
the Servant, but these references serve to authenticate the Servant’s work.
The Lord God
has given the Servant the tongue of a teacher (or a disciple or a learned
person). This suggests that there has been an ongoing communication between God
and the Servant—with God conveying wisdom and the Servant listening, as good
disciples do, to absorb every syllable. Without having listened to God, the
Servant would have nothing to say to his weary people. Having listened,
however, the Servant has God-given power to sustain the weary. That is no mean
feat, because these people have suffered through a long exile and are very,
very weary. God has commissioned the Servant to encourage them—to bring them
hope. That would be impossible except that God makes it possible.[2]
[1]
Palm Sunday Images, © Ed Riojas, Higher Things
[3]
Collect for Tuesday of the week of Lent 5, For All the Saints, A Prayer Book
For and By the Church, Vol. III © 1995 The American Lutheran Publicity Bureau,
Delhi, NY
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