1. One of the ways we know the Bible is the inerrant Word of God is the fulfillment of Bible prophecy.
2. Isaiah wrote this prophecy seven hundred years before Jesus was born in Bethlehem. Therefore, we know this is the Word of God.
3. A number of years ago, one of our members was talking with a Jewish friend. She asked her to read Isaiah 53, and then asked her, "Who do you think this is talking about?"
4. The Jewish lady replied, "Jesus Christ."
5. The Christian lady then said, "That's right, and what are you going to do now?"
6. The Jewish lady said, "Nothing. If I ever converted to Christianity my family would be very upset."
7. In Revelation 21:8 there is a list of sinners that will be cast into the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone -- the unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, etc.
8. But at the top of the list -- first and foremost -- is "the fearful."
9. This week our Jewish friends celebrate the Passover, commemorating the day on which the Israelites, preparing to depart from Egypt, were bidden by God to slay and eat a lamb, and to sprinkle their door posts with its blood, so that the destroying angel, seeing the blood, might pass over their dwellings.
10. Of course, this all pointed to the Lord Jesus Christ and His sacrificial death on the cross (cf. Isaiah 53:5-7).
11. The apostle Paul said, "For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us" (I Cor. 5:7).
12. According to the Gospels, Christ was crucified during the Passover.

I. OUR LORD'S SORROWS (53:1-4)

1. Isaiah 53:3 says, "He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows..."
2. P.P. Bliss wrote,

Man of Sorrows! what a name
For the Son of God, who came
Ruined sinners to reclaim.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

3. The singer Ira Sankey worked often with P.P. Bliss and with evangelist D.L. Moody also. Sankey wrote this about Bliss' song, "Man of Sorrows" (Hallelujah! What a Saviour).
4. "This was the last hymn I heard Mr. Bliss sing. It was at a meet­ing in Far­well Hall in Chi­ca­go, con­duct­ed by Hen­ry Moore­house. A few weeks be­fore his death Mr. Bliss vis­it­ed the State pri­son at Jack­son, Mi­chi­gan, where, af­ter a ve­ry touch­ing ad­dress on 'The Man of Sorrows,' he sang this hymn with great ef­fect. Ma­ny of the pri­son­ers dat­ed their con­ver­sion from that day."
5. Many prisoners were converted because the preacher emphasized Christ's vicarious death (53:4, 5).
6. Isaiah 53:4 says, "Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows..."
7. Isaiah 53:3 says, "He is despised and rejected of men..." Christ is despised by worldly men. They use His name only as a curse word.
8. It grieves me to hear people use God's name in vain. The Bible says, "The LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain" (Exodus 20:7).
9. If you are talking to someone and they take God's name in vain, you should reprove them.
10. And if you are watching television and someone takes our Lord's name in vain you ought to turn it off immediately.

II. OUR LORD'S SUFFERING (53:5, 6).

1. Isaiah's great Messianic prophecy emphasizes that Christ died for our sins (53:5).
2. Isaiah 53:5 says, "But he was wounded for our transgressions..."
3. The word "transgression" literally means "rebellion against God."
4. In fact, that is how the Hebrew word is translated in Job 34:37 -- "For he addeth rebellion unto his sin."
5. This great prophecy is quoted by Peter -- "Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed" (I Peter 2:24).
6. For two thousand years, people have argued over who was responsible for our Lord's death on the cross. Gentiles have accused the Jews of crucifying Christ and this has been the basis for much anti-Semitism over the years.
7. Others have pointed out that Pontius Pilate and Herod and the Roman soldiers were responsible.
8. In fact they were all responsible. Acts 4:27 says, "For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together..."
9. Then the next verse says, "For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done."
10. That is precisely what Isaiah 53 teaches --

• "yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted" (53:4)
• "and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all" (53:6)
• "Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief" (53:10)

11. Our Lord said in John 10:17 and 18, "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again..."

III. OUR LORD'S SACRIFICE (53:5-8)

1. Verse 7 says, "He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter." John the Baptist, seeing Jesus coming unto him, saith, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world" (John 1:29).
2. And all throughout the book of Revelation, the Lord Jesus Christ is referred to as "the Lamb."
3. In Revelation 5, the apostle John says, "And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands; Saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain..." (Rev. 5:11, 12).
4. Revelation 1:5 says, "Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood." Our Lord's death was a vicarious death (cf. Acts 8:26-40, esp. verse 32).
5. This is the doctrine of substitutionary atonement. Christ died for our sins. "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8).
6. First Peter 3:18 says, "For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust..."
7. The vicarious death of Christ is the heart of the Gospel (I Cor. 15:1-4). Any so-called "gospel" that leaves out the substitutionary death of Christ is a false gospel!
8. Preachers talk about a "social gospel" and a "prosperity gospel" and so on but these are not Scriptural.

• Second Corinthians 5:21 says, God “made Him, who knew no sin, to be sin for us."
• Galatians 1:4 says Christ “gave Himself for us sins.”
• Ephesians 1:7 says, “In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.”
• Philippians 2:8 says, "He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross."
• Isaiah 53:8 says, "For He was cut off..." Isaiah wasn't the only prophet to use those words in reference to Christ.
• Daniel 9:26 says, "And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself..." Not for himself -- but for you and me!

9. The Gospel simply means "good news," but you cannot have good news without "bad news." The bad news is that sinners who do not believe in Christ go to hell (Mark 16:15, 16).
10. A pastor went through a few newspapers and magazines and clipped out various church advertisements. One church advertised: "There is no fire and brimstone here. No Bible-thumping. Just practical, witty messages." Another church said, "You won't hear people threatened with hell or referred to as sinners. The goal is to make people welcome, not drive them away."
11. Another church boasted: "As with all preachers, this preacher's answer is God -- but he slips him in at the end, even then he doesn't get too heavy. No ranting, no raving. No fire, no brimstone. He doesn't even use the H-word" (John MacArthur, Ashamed of the Gospel: When the Church Becomes Like the World).
12. May I say that these preachers are distorting the Gospel. It is a so-called "gospel" with no repentance, no judgment, no blood atonement, and no salvation. That is not "good news"!
13. By the vicarious death of the Lord Jesus Christ we mean that Christ, having no cause of death in Himself, voluntarily died on the cross on behalf of sinful men -- men whose sin deserved the righteous wrath of God.
14. You cannot get a man saved till he first realizes he is lost.

CONCLUSION:

1. One hundred years ago, the most famous preacher in Brooklyn was Dr. DeWitt Talmage.
2. One day he was traveling in a horse-drawn carriage with three other men. They were all strangers to him, and the most robust and healthiest looking man of the group sat next to Dr. Talmage.
3. They were following a casket to the cemetery, where Dr. Talmage was to conduct the burial service; and as they slowly crept their way along the street, a man was heard from a side street, shouting at the top of his voice, "Who will be the next? Who will be the next?"
4. He was a vendor selling fruit and what he meant was, "Who will be the next to buy my fruit?" But at first the men in the carriage thought he meant, "Who will be the next to be buried?"
5. The appropriateness of it took hold of these men in the carriage, and the man sitting next to Dr. Talmage nudged him and said, "You know that is a very striking word that is coming from that vendor – Who will be the next? Now I am thinking and wondering who will be the next in this group to be carried to the cemetery. I am wondering, which one of us?"
6. Dr. Talmage asked the man, "Are you ready, if it should be you?"
7. The man replied, "No, I am not." Dr. Talmage soon discovered that the man was not saved and urged him to get right with God. "Would it not be a sad thing, then, if you should be the next?" he asked.
8. "Yes, but I certainly do not look like I would be the next, do I?" They reached the cemetery and their conversation ended.
9. The next morning at 2:00 A.M. some one rang Dr. Talmage’s door bell. Dr. Talmage’s servant answered the door and brought the news to Dr. Talmage. It was a message from the wife of the man in the carriage. She requested that Dr. Talmage come immediately. Her note said: "My husband is very ill. He is calling for you every moment, and he keeps saying over and over, ‘Who will be the next? Who will be the next?’"
10. Dr. Talmage hurried over to the man’s house. When he walked into the man’s bedroom, the man started weeping and cried out: "I am the next! I am the next!" And he was the next. He died before the sun arose.
11. The Lord Jesus Christ died for your sins, but in order to be saved you must believe in Him (John 3:16-18).
12. Let me ask, "Who will be the next?" It could be someone here who is just as unprepared as Dr. Talmage's friend!