“He was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and
made intercession for the transgressors.”-Isaiah 53:12.
A vague notion is abroad in the world that the benefit of Christ’s passion is
intended only for good people. The preaching of some ministers, and the talk
of some professors, would lead the uninstructed to imagine that Christ came
into the world to save the righteous, to call the godly to repentance, and to
heal those who never were sick. There is in most sinners’ consciences, when
they are aroused, a frightful fear that Christ could not have come to bless
such as they are, but that he must have intended the merit of his blood and
the efficacy of his passion for those who possess good works or feelings to
recommend them to him. Dear friends, you will clearly see, if you will but
open one eye, how inconsistent such a supposition is with the whole teaching
of Scripture. Consider the plan itself. It was a plan of salvation and of
necessity it was intended to bless sinners. Wherefore salvation if men be not
lost, and for whom salvation but for the ruined? The plan was based in grace,
but how “grace” unless it was meant for persons who deserve nothing? If you
have to deal with creatures who have not sinned, and have been obedient, what
need of grace? Build then on justice; let merit have its way. But as the
whole covenant is a covenant of grace, and as in the whole matter it was
ordained that grace should reign through righteousness unto eternal life, it
is plain enough from the very plan itself that it must have to do with
sinners and not with the righteous. Moreover, think of the work itself. The
work of Christ was to bring in a perfect righteousness. For whom, think you?
For those who had a righteousness? That were a superfluity. Why should he
weave a garment for those who were already clothed in scarlet and fine linen?
He had, moreover, to shed his blood. For whom his blood? Wherefore the agony
in the garden? Wherefore the cry upon the cross? For the perfect? Surely not,
beloved. What need had they of an atonement? Verily, brethren, the fact that
Jesus Christ bled for sin upon the cross bears, on its very surface, evidence
that he came into the world to save sinners. And then look at God’s end in
the whole work. It was to glorify himself, but how could God be glorified by
washing spotless souls, and by bringing to everlasting glory by grace those
who could have entered heaven by merit? Inasmuch as the plan and design both
aim at laying the greatness of human nature in the dust, and exalting God,
and making his love and his mercy to be magnified, it is implied as a matter
of necessity, that it came to deal with undeserving, ill-deserving sinners,
or else that end and aim never could be accomplished. Salvation needs a
sinner as the raw material upon which to exercise its workmanship; the
precious blood that cleanses needs a filthy sinner upon whom to show its
power to purge; the atonement of Christ needs guilt upon which to exercise
itself in the taking of it away; and it is absurd, it is ridiculous, it is
unworthy of God, to suppose a scheme of salvation, a work so tremendous as
the atonement of Christ, and an aim so splendid as the glorification of God,
unless there be sinners to be the instruments of God’s glory through being
the partakers of God’s grace. A moment’s thought will be enough to convince
us that the whole plan is made for sinners, and that “Jesus Christ died for
the ungodly.” Indeed, dear friends, it is only when we get this view very
clearly before us that we see Jesus in his glory. When does the shepherd
appear most lovely? It is a fair picture to pourtray him in the midst of his
flock, feeding them in the green pastures, and leading them beside the still
waters; but if my heart is to leap for joy, give me the shepherd pursuing his
stray sheep over the mountains; let me see him bringing home that sheep upon
his shoulders rejoicing; let me hear his song of mirth when he calleth upon
his friends and neighbours to rejoice with him because he has found the sheep
which was lost. When looks our God most like a loving and tender father?
Truly he looketh blessed when he divideth his inheritance among his sons, but
I never saw him so resplendent in his fatherhood as when he runneth out to
meet the prodigal, throweth his arms about his neck, and kisseth him, crying-
“My son that was dead is alive again.” Indeed, for some offices of Christ, it
is absolutely necessary that there should be a sinner for us to see any
meaning in them at all. He is a priest. What need of a priest except for the
sins of the people? Why, I dare to say it, Christ’s priesthood is a mockery
and Christ’s sacrifice is ridiculous unless there be sin in the world, and
sinners whom Jesus came to save. Brethren, how is he a Saviour except to the
lost? How is he a physician but to the sick? How is he like the brazen
serpent if he doth not save the sin-bitten, or how the scapegoat if he doth
not bear the sin of transgressors?
Our text, in its threefold character, shows the intimate connection which
exists between Jesus and sinners, for in none of its sentences is there
meaning unless there be a sinner, and unless Christ has come into connection
with him. It is this one point which I want to work out this morning, and may
God bless it to many a sinner’s troubled conscience. “He was numbered with
the transgressors; he bare the sin of many, and he made intercession for the
transgressors.” It is for transgressors all the way through. Bring in a
company of righteous people who think they have no sin and they cannot
appreciate the text; in fact it can have no meaning to them.
I. We shall begin then, by taking the first sentence. To the sinner, troubled
and alarmed on account of guilt, there will be much comfort in the thought
that CHRIST IS ENROLLED AMONG SINNERS. “He was numbered with the
transgressors.”
In what sense are we to understand this? “He was numbered with the
transgressors.”
He was numbered with them, first, in the census of the Roman empire. There
went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed,
and the espoused wife of Joseph, being great with child, must travel to
Bethlehem that Christ may be born there, and that he may be numbered with the
transgressing people who, for their sins, were subject to the Roman yoke.
Years rolled on, and that child who had been early numbered with
transgressors, and had received the seal of transgression in the
circumcision, which represents the putting away of the flesh-that child,
having come to manhood, goes forth into the world and is numbered with
transgressors in the scroll of fame. Ask public rumour “What is the character
of Jesus of Nazareth?” and it cannot find a word in its vocabulary foul
enough for him. “This—” they sometimes said; and our translators have
inserted the word “fellow” because in the original there is an ellipsis, the
evangelists, I suppose, hardly liking to write the word which had been cast
upon Christ Jesus. Fame, with her lying tongue, said he was a drunken man and
a wine-bibber, because he would not yield to the asceticism of the age. He
would not, since he came to be a man among men, do other than eat and drink
as other men did. He came not to set an example of asceticism but of
temperance; he came both eating and drinking, and they said at once, “Behold
a man gluttonous, and a winebibber.” They called him mad. His warm
enthusiasm, his stern and unflinching rebukes of wickedness in high places,
brought upon him the accusation that he had a devil. “Thou has a devil and
art mad,” said they. They called the Master of the house Beelzebub! Even the
drunkards made him their song, and the vilest thought him viler than
themselves, for he was, by current rumour, numbered with the transgressors.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
