Isaiah 53:10-11: But it was the Lord’s good plan to crush Him and cause Him grief. Yet when His life is made an offering for sin, He will have many descendants. He will enjoy a long life, and the Lord’s good plan will prosper in His hands. When He sees all that is accomplished by His anguish, He will be satisfied. And because of His experience, my righteous servant will make it possible for many to be counted righteous, for He will bear all their sins.

Isaiah wrote, “It pleased the Lord to bruise Him.” We know that Isaiah was speaking about Jesus, the Son of God. Nevertheless, if we were to read that statement with just a human understanding, it would almost sound as if God derived pleasure from the torture of His Son. However, that was not the case at all. Jesus had prayed while on earth that the will of the Father be fulfilled in His life through obedience.

Since Jesus was willing—obeying every command of the Father and choosing to suffer and die for the sins of the world—His offering pleased the Father. While Isaiah was writing under the leading of the Holy Spirit, he declared that the Messiah would come as an innocent Lamb of God and upon Him God would lay the sins of the entire world. It is inconceivable for us as humans to fully comprehend what Jesus had to undergo and suffer in order to appease the wrath of God and please the Father.

It’s inconceivable to us because Jesus was beaten and shamed like no other man. In addition to the things that we know through the written accounts of Jesus’ public flogging, beating, crucifixion, and burial, He endured all of this while the weight of every person’s sin and shame was upon Him. He was innocent of all false accusations and trumped-up charges, yet He accepted the punishment for our sin without revile or revenge.

Why is it so hard for us to fully understand the depth of love that Jesus had for His Father? Allow me to share some thoughts about the limitations of our humanity. As humans, we can only handle so much falsehood spoken against us and not want to defend ourselves. We are limited in our humanity as to the degree of suffering we can incur and endure without lashing out at the perpetrator. When you take both of those thoughts and add in the truth that we are the ones who were guilty, and He was innocent, this exceeds the realm of human love or strength. Lest you might tend to believe that He was God on the cross, and this gave Him the power to overcome sin, let me remind you of the scripture, “My God, My God why have You forsaken Me?” To me, this is the powerful thing about what Jesus was willing and empowered to do while on the cross. Since Jesus said “yes” to God in the Garden of Gethsemane, God empowered Him to suffer for our sins as an innocent Man. Please note that Jesus allowed, not the wrath of man, but the love of God to flow through His heart while He hung on the cross. He made a conscious decision to love, and God gave Him the power to love as “a Man” on the cross. I pray that this Word in some way helps you to better understand the depth of love that Jesus had for His Father, as well as the depth of love that the Father has for the world.

While Jesus was in His greatest moment of agony, He summoned enough strength and love to say, “Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” When the Father heard these Words proceed out of His Son’s mouth, it pleased the Father, and He has now forgiven all who have been found guilty before Him. All the Father requires is that we acknowledge the work that Jesus has already done on our behalf, believe on Jesus as the ONLY WAY to the Father, and turn from our sin; then, He will abundantly pardon us.  —submitted by Pastor Asa Dockery, US