The Nature and Mission of the Servant

This morning, we'll look at the second, the second song of the servant in which the servant will characteristically here start speaking in the first person. Last time in Isaiah 42, we see God saying, behold my servant, the one whom I love, the one who I delight in, and God speaks about him saying what he will be and what he will do. But this time, we get a first person perspective of who he is, his heart, his personality, his nature, and his mission. Let's read together from Isaiah 49. We're gonna read the first seven verses.

Isaiah 49:1. The servant speaks, "Listen to me, O coastlands, and give attention you peoples from afar. The Lord called me from the womb. From the body of my mother, He named my name. He made my mouth like a sharp sword.

In the shadow of His hand, He hid me. He made me a polished arrow. In His quiver, He hid me away. And He said to me, you are my servant Israel, in whom I will be glorified. But I said, I have laboured in vain.

I've spent my strength for nothing and vanity. Yet surely my right is with the Lord and my recompense with my God. And now the Lord says, He who formed me from the womb to be His servant, to bring Jacob back to Him and that Israel might be gathered to Him. For I am honoured in the eyes of the Lord and my God has become my strength. He says, it is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel.

I will make you as a light for the nations that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. Thus says the Lord, the redeemer of Israel and His holy one, to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nations, the servant of rulers. Kings shall see and arise, princes and they shall prostrate themselves because of the Lord who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you." So far our reading.

We see a change, a little bit of a change, and as we look at our series on getting the mosaic of Jesus Christ from the Old Testament and just mysterious glimpses of not simply what He will do and what He will say, but the way He will do these things. That's what I love about these servant songs, the way the Lord will do these things. We look and again, if we imagine ourselves as the first readers, as the first listeners to these words, perhaps as non-Christians reading the book of Isaiah for the first time, we might ask, who is this servant? Who is this servant? Is this perhaps Isaiah?

Is he talking about himself? In other places in the book of Isaiah, Isaiah speaks about himself. We just read in Isaiah chapter 6. Woe is me. I am unclean.

My lips are unclean. He speaks from a first person perspective. Is this what is going on here? Is Isaiah the servant of the Lord in this passage? But interestingly, as we read in verse three, we see that God says to him, you are my servant, and He calls him Israel.

This servant is known as Israel. So then we might think, well, maybe God is using Israel as a personification. Maybe the nation of Israel is now collectively being swept up here by God to say that Israel will perform a service to God. But then, again, it's not as straightforward, is it, as we read because you'll notice that as the passage goes on, it begins to say or calls the servant in verse five. It gives him this mission.

Verse five, now says the Lord, He who formed me from the womb to be a servant, you will bring Jacob back to Him. And that Israel might be gathered to Him. So what we find here is the servant being called Israel saving, rescuing, redeeming Israel. What's going on here? Well, the first assumption I think we can make is that this servant is not necessarily speaking about the geographical political nation of Israel.

It's not talking about the exiled Israel. And so we find a figure who God calls Israel who is actually going to come in order to save Israel. And what's intriguingly happening here is we find a kind of double dimension taking place in this passage. Within this passage, Israel is going to be the saviour of Israel. And so the question is, well, who then is this Israel who's going to save the other Israel?

Well, for the original listeners of Isaiah, this probably wasn't a problem. This probably wasn't a problem because we know that the hearers of Isaiah would have already had this idea of someone coming. Someone anointed. Someone they called the Messiah who would come, an individual. Earlier in the book of Isaiah, and I'm sure we'll hear it again in Christmas time, it's already popped up before in chapter 11 verse 1, Isaiah writes, "There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse. A branch from his roots shall bear fruit."

Now if you know your Old Testament history, you'll know that Jesse was the father of King David. So what is being talked about here is the royal bloodline. And this bloodline, we know in the story, in the context of Israel, had been cut off.

It is like a tree that had been chopped down, and there's just a stump left. And God says, but out of this stump, out of this stump that is the bloodline of the king, a sprout is gonna come forth. I remember, and I love when mom is here because I can just reference her, and mom went overseas one time when we were very young and she came back with a little gift, a little memento, souvenir of babushka dolls. Do we know what babushka dolls are? It's those hollow wooden carved figurines that five or six of them sort of fit into one.

And so you see this doll, you know, maybe it's this high, and it's beautifully painted, and it looks like a nice figurine, but then you pop off the top half and you see that there's another figurine inside it. And then you think, wow, that's pretty nifty, but lift it out and you pop it off again and there's another figurine, smaller, that fits inside that figurine. And so you go down until you get this little tiny girl inside the babushka doll. Like we see those figurines fitting into one another, something of this is happening here in this passage. There is the nation of Israel being talked about, but there is within this nation of Israel an Israel coming that is going to rescue the whole, that's going to bring back the whole to God.

And for the writers of the Bible inspired by the Holy Spirit, this is a wonderful and rich interplay that we find in the Bible all throughout. And the amazing thing is when we get to the gospel, it is just being used left, right, and centre. Again, just thinking of Christmas time, Matthew, in his account of the gospel, he writes that when Jesus was a baby and only a couple of years old, the persecution from Herod became so great they had to flee. Remember that? They went to Egypt.

And in Egypt, they stayed until the persecution was over, and then it says they came back. They came back to their homeland. And Matthew writes, this took place to fulfil the prophecy, "Out of Egypt I called my son." Now if we go and look up that prophecy in the Old Testament in Hosea 11:1, the context almost certainly is talking of Israel in the Exodus. God took Israel, a nation of slaves, a non-nation, and He called them forth like His own, like a son, to create them into a nation.

Out of Egypt, I called my son Israel, but Matthew says this applies to Christ as well. The Israel within the Israel. This is significant for us to know. In our understanding of biblical theology, it is almost crucial for us to know. This interplay between Jesus Christ as the perfected representative of Israel.

And it's got something to do with Israel's original mission. It's got something to do with what God had in mind for Israel when He formed them and called them out of Egypt in the first place. In Exodus 19, and I've often quoted it if you remember, Exodus 19:6, we find the mission statement of Israel, what God wanted His people to be. God says, the whole earth is mine, Israel, but you will be for me a kingdom of priests. And what God was intending, what God was aiming at when He said that is that this nation, although the whole world, all the nations belong to Him, this nation will be used to reveal Him and His character and the truth about Him to the ends of the earth.

God will use Israel as His mouthpiece. God will use them as His priests in mediating between Him and the world. But as we know, if we read our Bible, Israel failed. And they didn't fulfil this mission. They didn't fulfil this task. They protected this truth.

They selfishly guarded it. They removed themselves from the world instead. But they were always meant to be preachers. They were always meant to declare the excellencies, the wonders of God. But we see that now fulfilled in this servant, don't we?

The first thing we see about this servant is his preparation. And the preparation is all to do with a preaching ministry. It's beautifully expressed in verses one through to four. Listen to me, O coastlands. This is far reaching.

Listen to me. He's got a big voice. Give attention you peoples from afar. The Lord called me from the womb. And that's beautifully reflected, isn't it?

As we come to Christmas, how that worked, how that looked like. Mary and Joseph are told, here is the name that you are to call this child, Jesus, the one who saves. Now the angel explains that he is to be conceived by God coming upon her through the Holy Spirit, a miraculous event, that he is to be conceived, but from the moment he is conceived, he has a purpose. I've just had a friend who had their baby this week or last week, and the baby was born and they decided to name their baby a particular name. And after a few days, they decided, no.

That name doesn't work. We'll choose another name. And gave another name to the baby. Now I'm sure in the scheme of things, if that baby grows up to be a healthy adult in thirty years' time, it won't matter what he was originally called. But Jesus had a purpose and a set determined mission from time of conception.

Jesus, the one who will save. There is no accident here. There is no changing of mind. There is no, I think we can use him. The one who saves has been called forth from the womb.

God is saying this servant has a destiny. This servant's purpose is fixed by the Lord from the very beginning. From the very beginning, the Lord was going to use him. And then we see that there's a process involved in this preparation further as well. Verse two, He made my mouth.

He formed my mouth. This word is ongoing, this verb. He made my mouth like a sharp sword, like a polished arrow He formed me. Now that's probably a description of his preaching ministry. That is probably a clear indication that he would be a teacher.

We get clarification of that in Revelation 19:15 where Jesus comes to judge the earth and it says He arrives and a sword comes out from His mouth. He uses this sword to cut down His enemies. In the book of Hebrews, don't we? We find that the word is a sharp, razor sharp, double edged sword that God uses to cut to the heart of the elect, to cut to the heart of those He will call to be His. So what God is doing here in this passage is preparing him to preach, to share an incredible message that will pierce the hearts and the minds of people.

And we see this, don't we, in the gospels? We see that when people heard Jesus and He had come like a thief in the night. He had just appeared, and He started preaching, and they said, who is this man? Who is He? This teaching that He gives, it is new.

It is fresh. He speaks with authority. We have never heard these teachings before. He speaks and He applies it like the Pharisees and the teachers of the law never could. But do you notice what is combined with this?

It's very interesting. It says, He made my mouth like a sharp sword, but in the shadow of His hand, God hid me. God, in other words, has this sword up His sleeve. The quiver, the sharp arrow that can pierce even through armour is in the quiver. It's tucked away.

Now it seems very casual, but it's very true that the Lord had His Son up His sleeve for thirty years before He unleashed Him. And that was also part of the incredible, mind blowing mystery of the Son of Man. Everyone asked, He came from Nazareth. That backwater place. That dump.

It's, you know, like saying, He came from Logan. Now the idea of this hiddenness has got some relevance here. He's saying that there's a timing. There is a timing. Again, this has to do with the determination and the clear plan that God has for Him.

There is a perfect timing to this. The sword is up the sleeve in order to come out when it's needed. And we get a glimpse every now and then of the childhood of Christ, nothing in massive detail. More I would love to know. We see Him as a baby, we see Him at eight years old, and then bang, 30.

And yet, nothing compared to what we know of Him as compared to this incredible three year ministry. This incredibly powerful ministry that is only three and a half years long. Jesus is kept up God's sleeve and He is like an arrow kept in the quiver. And when Jesus started preaching and people heard Him, they asked, can this be the Messiah? Can this be the Messiah?

But in God's perfect timing, it is precisely that out of the dump of Nazareth, the Messiah is called. The land of Galilee, Isaiah predicts elsewhere, has seen a great light. The land of Gentiles, where Christ would come from, has been used by God. Now we'll understand exactly this mystery of why God would keep Him up His sleeve for that long next time. But this mystery and this timing element leads us to our second point, and that is that there is a rejection and that there is a suffering that takes place in the preaching and the ministry of the servant.

Verse four, the servant says, I have laboured in vain. I have laboured in vain. I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity. Yet surely my right is with the Lord and my recompense with my God.

That should be verse four up there. It's a typo. This servant will know suffering. His ministry will be built around him becoming the Israel that the world needed. It will be built around him becoming the Israel that God intended.

His ministry is the priesthood that would preach the gospel to the coastlands, to the ends of the earth. But we see his teaching is ultimately rejected. His ministry is cast aside. He would in fact pour himself out, deplete his strength in the service of God, and it will seem as though it all came to nothing. And again, we see that fulfilled in the life of Jesus, don't we?

Remember on the evening of the crucifixion, that intimate moment where Jesus said to His disciples, my heart is at the point of being overwhelmed with sorrow. And He says to them, all of you will reject me. All of you will walk away. And indeed, we see on the cross when those dark clouds came in on the cross and it was as if the world itself had rejected Christ. In the backdrop, we hear the crying of the women.

The men with their heads in their hands at sight. And it seems as though it was all for nothing. But then we see that last half of verse four, the great turn in this passage, yet surely, surely my right, my right is with the Lord. My recompense with my God. To recompense is to compensate.

It is to repay someone that has been harmed, to compensate a loss that has been suffered. And so we get this bit of hope that this is not the end of the story. Even when Jesus cried out, my God, my God, why have you also forsaken me? A few moments later, Jesus also used the words, Father, it is done. It is finished and into your hands, I entrust my spirit.

Father, your mission for me is accomplished. I have come and I have preached. I have spent my strength in your service. I am the Son who you delighted in. I am the servant you sent to serve.

I am the priest who ushered a people to be your holy people, to have communion with you. And now, I trust that you will not forsake me. And God and Jesus in that moment had this connection of compensation, of vindication, and it's incredible to think that God the Son emptied Himself of so much authority to so very little that He needed to depend on the Father's will to redeem Him from the grave. That is astounding to imagine. But Christ, in some way, knew that He didn't have the authority to take it up again.

In some way, that I trust. And we see that in Paul, that it is the Spirit of God through the Father that raises Christ from the dead. It wasn't Christ Himself. And He entrusts Himself into the vindication of God the Father. And yet, with a magnificent turnaround, three days later, God the Father comes through and His sacrifice is deemed perfect.

And His service is enough and His ministry is complete. And that brings us to the third part of this passage. And this is where the mission of the servant and the mission then of his church is in view. Despite the sufferings of the servant, his preaching and his teaching, the message has won. This is what we see.

The message has won. It has returned to God fruitful. There is an exaltation and a reward for this servant's ministry. And we see that from verse five, what the servant has accomplished. Verse five, the last half, it was to bring Jacob back to Him.

It was to bring Israel back to God. Friends, this is the story of the prodigal son that God brought back to the Father. This was the mission of the servant. The mission was to bring lost people home. To find the lost sheep, to call home the wanderers who know and have realised that they have wandered very far from God.

But the focus then is not so much here on the lost sheep, is it? It's sort of mentioned, but the focus here is on the glory and the majesty that the servant receives after this incredible ministry. In verse six, God says, it is too light a thing for you that you, my servant, should raise up just the tribe of Jacob. You will be sent for the nations. You will be sent for the world.

I will make you as a light to the nations that my salvation may reach the ends of the earth. This is far more than a geographical location, friends. This is far more than a nation, Israel. It is far more than a political state. God's people will be more than Israel.

Let me say that again. God's people is more than Israel. It will be the nations. It will be the world. And remember, Exodus 19:6.

You are to be for me a royal priesthood. You are to be for me a kingdom of priests. What is the end game here? It is to bring the whole world to God. The whole world belongs to me, and I will use you to bring them back to me.

And this mission, this ministry of the servant built around the good news that he would preach even in the midst of suffering. Isaiah now says is available to the world. It is no surprise then that Jesus also declared, I am the light of the world. He said that and claimed that of Himself. In other words, I give meaning and I give insight and I give truth and I give purpose to your life and to the meaning of life.

I'm the light by which you will understand and see everything. Isaiah writes about the moments of Christmas, the moment of Jesus' birth elsewhere where it says the people walking in darkness have seen a great light. To those living in a land of deep darkness, a light has dawned. Hallelujah. And God the Father declares then, for you, it is too small a thing for just Israel.

This has to be for the world. And through the whole world, the majesty and the glory of Christ is multiplied exponentially. Exponentially. It is one thing for a nation to be redeemed politically and geographically, for refugees to be sent back home. It is one thing for people to be saved physically, but this is a salvation of eternal significance.

Hearts and souls for eternity saved and not just for a few million people, the world. And the glory of the servant is so majestic and it is so overwhelming that it says in verse seven, the Lord, the redeemer of Israel and the Holy One, to the one deeply despised and abhorred by the nation says to him, kings shall see and rise. Princes will bow down and prostrate themselves before you. The one, however, who was deeply despised and we hear those voices, crucify him. Crucify him.

It says there in verse seven that he was the servant of rulers. The servant of rulers. And at the hands of the rulers, he was crucified, Caiaphas, Herod, Pontius Pilate, the servant. But the kings shall rise when He comes. Now if you know anything about the monarchy, if you are a royalist, you know, true blue Aussie, say that with tongue firmly in cheek, you will know that the queen does not rise for anyone.

If you were to walk into or be invited into the study of the queen, she will remain seated. She will remain seated and shake your hand, and you will bow and curtsy when you greet her. More so when she's sitting on the throne. A king or a queen does not rise for anyone. And yet the servant of all the rulers will have all the kings rise for him.

The princes who usually get the bows, they now fall on their faces before him. The majesty and the glory and the ever living awe of who Christ is brings even the highest and the most noble and the most powerful people to their knees in worship and reverence. Why? Because to save a nation from a political geographical exile is one thing. To have saved Israel from Babylon would be one thing and someone called Cyrus did.

But to save the souls of peoples across the world, across the ages for all eternity, that is something altogether glorious. And no king or queen can do that. And so it is too light a thing for you to save only Israel. It is for the world that you will be sent. Now church, this is a message that needs to resonate with us on many, many levels.

On the one level, we are grateful and we are thankful that we see ourselves as the nations. We are not part of the Jewish people. I dare say not any of us are part of the Jewish people, and yet we have received this incredible salvation from God. But there's another level to this, a far more practical level. Something that we as a church must take into this week.

And I don't think it's an unfair statement to make from this passage this morning to say that it is too light a thing for Christ to only save people in this church. It is a disappointment to His glory to think that way. It is too light a thing to think that this is enough for His glory. Majesty, if we are amazed and are humbled to think that this Saviour will receive the adulation and the praise of kings and princes one day, if we truly delight in His glory, then it is too light a thing for us to not go on being a kingdom of priests. The apostle Peter ties it all together, doesn't he, when he says that the church is a royal priesthood, a holy nation with this mission that we proclaim the excellencies and the wonders of Him who called you out of darkness and brought you into His marvellous light.

And so we are reminded that we are to bring people to the light. We don't hide His glory. We share the glory of the gospel and we believe that it has the power to save. We believe that it has the power to convince, to persuade even the hardest of hearts. Because that sword is sharp.

That arrow pierces any armour. Let's be doing that, church. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, you are magnified. Magnified.

Let your name be glorified in our lives. O God, we look forward to that day when we will see the kings and the rulers of this earth cast their crowns at your feet, that the richest and the wisest will come and find their meaning and their wealth in you. Help us, Lord, in the shortcomings of our heart to not desire your glory to be magnified. Forgive us, God, when we don't dwell on it, when we don't desire it for you, when we are not absolutely zealous for that glory. But Father, thank you that we could not even begin to desire those things if it was not for having sent your Son, our servant, to bring us back to you.

And not just Jacob, not just Israel, but the nations of which we are a part. So we thank you, Lord. We thank you for the sacrifice of our Saviour on the cross so humbly and so determinedly going there for us, forgiving us and three days later being victorious, being recompensed, being compensated, being vindicated for offering Himself and emptying Himself for us. But Lord, it is too light a thing to hold this for ourselves. It is too light a thing for you to have only saved me. There's so many more.

And so, Father, give us the vigour and the courage and the determination to magnify your glory, to grow your church, to be an incredible voice as we've already said to a nation that's very far. Help us, O God. Equip us for this. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.