Lamb of God
Commentary
The Manual on the Liturgy that accompanies the Lutheran Book of Worship warns us about allowing the Good Friday service to become "a funeral for Jesus." The mood may have somber elements -- preserved for instance in an emotional "stripping of the altar" -- but the lessons appointed for this day direct us to evaluate what is happening from a divine perspective. Jesus' crucifixion -- like the humiliation of the Servant in the prophet's song -- is somehow seen by God as a glorification, and is presented by God as an image to inspire hope and renewal.
Isaiah 52:13--53:12
We have here the fourth and the last of what are called Servant Songs in the book of Isaiah. We read another one of them last Sunday. The other two are Isaiah 42:1-4 and 49:1-7. In these four poems, the prophet appears now to speak of Jesus Christ. Some Old Testament scholars get testy about this claim and want to say he was talking about Cyrus of Persia or about himself or about the role Israel would play in bringing salvation to the nations. I don't know -- the argument seems silly to me. Prophets, almost by definition, speak of more than they themselves realize. For us to say that these words refer to Jesus does not imply that Deutero-Isaiah himself somehow saw into the future and described the crucifixion.
This song is about Jesus, as many New Testament writers realized. It is cited or alluded to in all four of the Gospels, as well as in Acts 8:32-35 and 1 Peter 2:22-24. Numerous details parallel elements in the passion account, such as the silence before accusers (v. 7) and the tomb with the rich (v. 9). The word the NRSV translated "wounded" in verse 5 is literally "pierced." The metaphorical description of the sufferer as a sacrificial lamb (v. 7) offers a close connection to Johannine thought (John 1:29). Indeed, this poem, with its repeated references to the bearing of griefs or iniquities (53:4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 11, 12) was probably the key scripture for guiding early Christians to interpret Jesus' death as a substitutionary atonement.
One observation is especially important for relating the text to the Johannine passion. Structurally, the poem presents two different points of view. The central section (53:1-11a) describes the people's perspective on God's Servant, a perspective that changes when they realize his suffering was for their benefit. But this is all framed by an introduction (52:13-15) and a conclusion (53:11b-12) that presents God's point of view. God does not view the suffering of the Servant as a humiliation or defeat but as a victory. The Servant succeeds at doing what God sent him to do and so he shall be "lifted up." The latter term has a double sense. It means that he will be vindicated and glorified, but also that his humiliation will call attention to something that people need to see (52:14-15).
This language is precisely what John uses to describe the crucifixion of Jesus. In John, the term acquires a triple sense. When Jesus was crucified, his body was literally "lifted up" from the earth, hung on a stick in the air. But to this gruesome image may be added two meanings retained from Isaiah. Jesus is also being "lifted up" in the sense of being glorified and in the sense of becoming an example of God's love that will draw all people (John 12:32). They will come to see what they had not yet perceived: that God so loved the world ... (John 3:16).
Hebrews 10:16-25
The lesson begins by quoting Jeremiah 31:33-34 to interpret Jesus' death on the cross as facilitating the forgiveness of sins. As such, it is in complete concert with the first lesson, drawing only from a different prophet and adding covenant imagery to the mix. But there's more. The word "therefore" in verse 19 introduces a section that tells us what comes next. It adds what might almost be a third stanza to that section of Isaiah's song that dealt with the human point of view concerning God's Servant:
First, we esteemed such a one as being of no account, assuming perhaps that the suffering is an indication of failure or even an affliction brought by God (Isaiah 53:2-3).
Second, we realized his suffering was for us (Isaiah 53:4-5), which changed our perspective on it radically.
What would come next? Guilt? Shame? Penitence?
Hebrews says hope (v. 23)! The results are decidedly positive. The realization that Jesus died for us stimulates us to love and good deeds, and to the promotion of community.
John 18:1--19:42
As promised (see last Sunday's Gospel lesson), I present now a list of key themes in the Johannine passion, to complement those described for Luke (see outline). In many cases, these pick up on points that are introduced earlier in the Gospel and then come to fruition in the chapters read today. In John, as in the other Gospels, the passion story is not just an epilogue attached at the end, but the grand conclusion in which all sorts of narrative threads come together. The whole story has been building up to this.
The theme of Jesus' death as a sacrifice fits well with both of the other two lessons. Of the four Gospels, only John describes Jesus as the "Lamb of God." And it is only in John that Jesus is said to die at the very hour that the Passover lamb was slain.
The theme of Jesus' death as a glorification that will show forth God's love for the world is also prominent in the other texts, especially the first lesson. This, too, is related to salvation. John envisions humanity as enslaved not only by sin but also by ignorance and deception. People do not experience the abundant, meaningful life that God intends (John 10:10) because they do not know the truth (John 8:32). "What is truth?" Pilate asks in John's Gospel (18:38), and the book's readers are no doubt expected to do the same. It is not just any truth that is of interest here; it is ultimate truth, which for John means truth about God. Perhaps the most important thing Jesus does in this Gospel is to reveal God. The last verse of the Gospel's prologue makes this point succinctly: the basic problem is that "no one has ever seen God"; the solution to this problem is that, now, Jesus has made God known (1:18). To be even more specific, they do not know the truth about God's love for this world (3:16). And this truth is revealed most clearly in Jesus' death on the cross. "No one has greater love than this," Jesus says, "than to lay down one's life for one's friends" (John 15:13). Thus the death of Jesus works for salvation in a different way than that found in the other Gospels. By presenting Jesus as the "lamb of God" (1:29), John affirms the traditional notion that the death of Jesus may be likened to a sacrifice that atones for sins. But on another level, his voluntary death demonstrates in an ultimate way the greatness of God's love and thus reveals the true nature of God. People who come to know this truth are set free from false notions of God as a threatening figure; people who believe what Jesus reveals about the love of God have life that does not perish, life that is abundant and eternal.
THE PASSION OF JESUS IN THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
Theme: Jesus Is in Control
Jesus chooses Judas, knowing he will betray him (6:70-71; 13:27-30). Jesus claims no one can take his life, but he will freely lay it down, knowing he can take it up again (10:17-18).
Satan has no power over Jesus (14:30).
Soldiers have no power over Jesus -- they fall down at his word (18:6).
Pilate has no power over Jesus, save that which is allowed him (19:10-11).
Theme: Jesus' Death Is His Glorification
Jesus (as the Word) was in the beginning with God and was God (1:1-2).
Jesus comes to earth as the Word made flesh to dwell among us (1:14).
Even while on earth, Jesus and the Father are one (14:8-10).
Jesus' death is the hour when he departs this world and goes to the Father (13:1).
Through death, Jesus returns to his pre-existent state of glory (17:5).
Theme: Jesus' Death Is a Sacrifice
Jesus is called the "Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (1:29).
Jesus dies at noon on Passover, the time when the Passover lamb is slain (19:14).
Theme: Jesus' Death Is an Exaltation and Victory
Three times, Jesus refers to his death as his being "lifted up" (3:14; 8:28; 12:32).
At his death, Jesus cries, "It is finished!" (19:30), a claim to have accomplished what he intended to do.
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Isaiah 52:13--53:12
This is the fourth and final Servant Song in Second Isaiah, and because of its content, it has been called the Suffering Servant Song. As with the Servant Song that we dealt with on Passion Sunday, it was originally a prophecy considering an idealized Israel. Second Isaiah set before the exiles in Babylonia the task of giving their life for the sake of the world. Israel was despised and rejected in exile, cursed by all who saw her plight. But there would come a time when God would deliver her from captivity and exalt her among the nations. When other peoples saw her salvation, then they would realize that God had subjected Israel to judgment in order that he might manifest his power to save her before all the world. Israel would become the living testimony to the God of judgment and of salvation, and by that testimony, all peoples would be led to worship the Lord.
That is the dialogue that is carried out in this song. The Lord speaks in 52:13-15. Then the foreign nations take up the speech in 53:1-10, and finally God ends the speech in 53:11-12. The foreigners are utterly amazed that the people whom they thought had been rejected by God were instead delivered by that God and raised on high. Israel was as good as dead in exile, and yet God gave her new life. Surely God must have had a purpose for doing such a thing, and the nations realize that Israel went through suffering and death for their sake, that they might be saved.
Second Isaiah is thus calling his people to a missionary task in this poem. But as in all the Old Testament, it is not the task of actively going forth into the world and proclaiming the ways of God. Rather, it is the task of being God's true servant, willing to submit to his will, even unto death. It is the task of truly being God's people, in order that the nations may see God's work in Israel and turn and worship the Lord.
If we were to translate that into our life, our God-given task as the church would be truly to be the church, so dedicated to the service of God that we would be willing to die in order to carry out God's will. We would be willing to give up everything -- our money, our building, our programs, our reputation -- if such sacrifice would further God's purpose of saving all peoples.
There have been Christians who have done that -- Kagawa of Japan, who gave his eyesight and finally his life to live among the poor of Japan; Mother Teresa, who gave up all to take the dying off the streets of India and to comfort them with the love of God in their last days; Martin Luther King, Jr., who braved prison and scorn, police dogs and beatings to turn around the conscience of a nation; Albert Schweitzer, who left a promising career as a musician and theologian to minister to the sick in the jungles of Africa; dozens of women and men who everywhere have given up this world's goods and status to serve Christ in slums and hospices, orphanages and storefront churches across the land. And yes, faithful mothers who spend hours with their disabled or retarded children, and faithful husbands who exhaust themselves in the care of a spouse with Alzheimer's disease. All have been suffering servants of their Lord, willing to surrender everything to serve him.
When you talk to such people, most of them are not joyless, however. Rather, their hope is in God, whom they know will finally say, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you." And such persons are powerful witnesses to the workings of God, aren't they? Like the Suffering Servant drawing all nations to God, faithful souls draw others to him, to find the strength, the hope, the joy that so illumines their faithful lives.
There was One, however, who outdid us all in sacrifice and joy as the Suffering Servant. When the disciples and apostles and authors of the New Testament strained to tell who Jesus Christ is, they could do no other but describe his life and death and resurrection in terms of this Suffering Servant song.
Everywhere throughout the New Testament, the words of this song sound forth. Jesus is the one who gives his life as a ransom for many, says Mark (10:45), and who is silent before his oppressors at his trial (Mark 14:61). Jesus is reckoned with the transgressors, writes Luke (22:37), condemned as a criminal and hung on a cross between two thieves. He is like Second Isaiah's lamb that is led to the slaughter, in the Book of Acts (8:32), but he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, in John (1:29). Jesus' grave is made with a rich man called Joseph of Arimathea (Matthew 27:57-60), yet certainly he had committed no sin and spoken no guile (1 Peter 2:22). And like the nations in the Suffering Servant Song, we have come to realize that our Lord is the one by whose stripes, whose whipping, we were healed when we had all gone astray like sheep (1 Peter 2:24-25).
The final, true servant of God is our Lord Jesus Christ. He became in his death what Israel was always meant to be. His trial and unjust sentence by Pilate, his death on the cross between two robbers, his burial in a borrowed grave fulfilled the words of our prophet. But we must remember why that death took place -- to take upon himself our sins and to suffer the punishment we deserved from God for our evil ways.
On this Good Friday, perhaps we all should adopt the role of the foreign nations in our Servant Song, and confess with them that Jesus "was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed" (Isaiah 53:5). Christ died in our place, taking upon himself our wrong. He gave his life for our sakes that we might not die. For "the wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23), and you and I are sinners.
There was something else, however, that the foreigners realized, according to our passage. They came to understand that "it was the will of the Lord to bruise" the servant, and that it was God who had put the servant "to grief" (v. 10). It was God's will that our Lord Jesus die on the cross of Golgotha. Jesus had prayed in the garden of Gethsemane that, if possible, he not go to the cross. But our Lord realized that such was the will of his Father. And so he gave up his life willingly, because that was the plan of his Father. Not because his God was some sort of abusing Father. Not because God desired vengeance and blood. Heaven help us if those are our thoughts! No, it was the will of God that his Son die on the cross, because God loves us and wants to save us. God took upon himself our sin in the person of his Son. God himself bore our iniquities instead of holding us accountable for them. And that was pure love and pure mercy extended to us by our heavenly Father. Surely, our only response can be the one that we sing in Isaac Watts' great hymn: "Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all."
Isaiah 52:13--53:12
We have here the fourth and the last of what are called Servant Songs in the book of Isaiah. We read another one of them last Sunday. The other two are Isaiah 42:1-4 and 49:1-7. In these four poems, the prophet appears now to speak of Jesus Christ. Some Old Testament scholars get testy about this claim and want to say he was talking about Cyrus of Persia or about himself or about the role Israel would play in bringing salvation to the nations. I don't know -- the argument seems silly to me. Prophets, almost by definition, speak of more than they themselves realize. For us to say that these words refer to Jesus does not imply that Deutero-Isaiah himself somehow saw into the future and described the crucifixion.
This song is about Jesus, as many New Testament writers realized. It is cited or alluded to in all four of the Gospels, as well as in Acts 8:32-35 and 1 Peter 2:22-24. Numerous details parallel elements in the passion account, such as the silence before accusers (v. 7) and the tomb with the rich (v. 9). The word the NRSV translated "wounded" in verse 5 is literally "pierced." The metaphorical description of the sufferer as a sacrificial lamb (v. 7) offers a close connection to Johannine thought (John 1:29). Indeed, this poem, with its repeated references to the bearing of griefs or iniquities (53:4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 11, 12) was probably the key scripture for guiding early Christians to interpret Jesus' death as a substitutionary atonement.
One observation is especially important for relating the text to the Johannine passion. Structurally, the poem presents two different points of view. The central section (53:1-11a) describes the people's perspective on God's Servant, a perspective that changes when they realize his suffering was for their benefit. But this is all framed by an introduction (52:13-15) and a conclusion (53:11b-12) that presents God's point of view. God does not view the suffering of the Servant as a humiliation or defeat but as a victory. The Servant succeeds at doing what God sent him to do and so he shall be "lifted up." The latter term has a double sense. It means that he will be vindicated and glorified, but also that his humiliation will call attention to something that people need to see (52:14-15).
This language is precisely what John uses to describe the crucifixion of Jesus. In John, the term acquires a triple sense. When Jesus was crucified, his body was literally "lifted up" from the earth, hung on a stick in the air. But to this gruesome image may be added two meanings retained from Isaiah. Jesus is also being "lifted up" in the sense of being glorified and in the sense of becoming an example of God's love that will draw all people (John 12:32). They will come to see what they had not yet perceived: that God so loved the world ... (John 3:16).
Hebrews 10:16-25
The lesson begins by quoting Jeremiah 31:33-34 to interpret Jesus' death on the cross as facilitating the forgiveness of sins. As such, it is in complete concert with the first lesson, drawing only from a different prophet and adding covenant imagery to the mix. But there's more. The word "therefore" in verse 19 introduces a section that tells us what comes next. It adds what might almost be a third stanza to that section of Isaiah's song that dealt with the human point of view concerning God's Servant:
First, we esteemed such a one as being of no account, assuming perhaps that the suffering is an indication of failure or even an affliction brought by God (Isaiah 53:2-3).
Second, we realized his suffering was for us (Isaiah 53:4-5), which changed our perspective on it radically.
What would come next? Guilt? Shame? Penitence?
Hebrews says hope (v. 23)! The results are decidedly positive. The realization that Jesus died for us stimulates us to love and good deeds, and to the promotion of community.
John 18:1--19:42
As promised (see last Sunday's Gospel lesson), I present now a list of key themes in the Johannine passion, to complement those described for Luke (see outline). In many cases, these pick up on points that are introduced earlier in the Gospel and then come to fruition in the chapters read today. In John, as in the other Gospels, the passion story is not just an epilogue attached at the end, but the grand conclusion in which all sorts of narrative threads come together. The whole story has been building up to this.
The theme of Jesus' death as a sacrifice fits well with both of the other two lessons. Of the four Gospels, only John describes Jesus as the "Lamb of God." And it is only in John that Jesus is said to die at the very hour that the Passover lamb was slain.
The theme of Jesus' death as a glorification that will show forth God's love for the world is also prominent in the other texts, especially the first lesson. This, too, is related to salvation. John envisions humanity as enslaved not only by sin but also by ignorance and deception. People do not experience the abundant, meaningful life that God intends (John 10:10) because they do not know the truth (John 8:32). "What is truth?" Pilate asks in John's Gospel (18:38), and the book's readers are no doubt expected to do the same. It is not just any truth that is of interest here; it is ultimate truth, which for John means truth about God. Perhaps the most important thing Jesus does in this Gospel is to reveal God. The last verse of the Gospel's prologue makes this point succinctly: the basic problem is that "no one has ever seen God"; the solution to this problem is that, now, Jesus has made God known (1:18). To be even more specific, they do not know the truth about God's love for this world (3:16). And this truth is revealed most clearly in Jesus' death on the cross. "No one has greater love than this," Jesus says, "than to lay down one's life for one's friends" (John 15:13). Thus the death of Jesus works for salvation in a different way than that found in the other Gospels. By presenting Jesus as the "lamb of God" (1:29), John affirms the traditional notion that the death of Jesus may be likened to a sacrifice that atones for sins. But on another level, his voluntary death demonstrates in an ultimate way the greatness of God's love and thus reveals the true nature of God. People who come to know this truth are set free from false notions of God as a threatening figure; people who believe what Jesus reveals about the love of God have life that does not perish, life that is abundant and eternal.
THE PASSION OF JESUS IN THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
Theme: Jesus Is in Control
Jesus chooses Judas, knowing he will betray him (6:70-71; 13:27-30). Jesus claims no one can take his life, but he will freely lay it down, knowing he can take it up again (10:17-18).
Satan has no power over Jesus (14:30).
Soldiers have no power over Jesus -- they fall down at his word (18:6).
Pilate has no power over Jesus, save that which is allowed him (19:10-11).
Theme: Jesus' Death Is His Glorification
Jesus (as the Word) was in the beginning with God and was God (1:1-2).
Jesus comes to earth as the Word made flesh to dwell among us (1:14).
Even while on earth, Jesus and the Father are one (14:8-10).
Jesus' death is the hour when he departs this world and goes to the Father (13:1).
Through death, Jesus returns to his pre-existent state of glory (17:5).
Theme: Jesus' Death Is a Sacrifice
Jesus is called the "Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (1:29).
Jesus dies at noon on Passover, the time when the Passover lamb is slain (19:14).
Theme: Jesus' Death Is an Exaltation and Victory
Three times, Jesus refers to his death as his being "lifted up" (3:14; 8:28; 12:32).
At his death, Jesus cries, "It is finished!" (19:30), a claim to have accomplished what he intended to do.
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Isaiah 52:13--53:12
This is the fourth and final Servant Song in Second Isaiah, and because of its content, it has been called the Suffering Servant Song. As with the Servant Song that we dealt with on Passion Sunday, it was originally a prophecy considering an idealized Israel. Second Isaiah set before the exiles in Babylonia the task of giving their life for the sake of the world. Israel was despised and rejected in exile, cursed by all who saw her plight. But there would come a time when God would deliver her from captivity and exalt her among the nations. When other peoples saw her salvation, then they would realize that God had subjected Israel to judgment in order that he might manifest his power to save her before all the world. Israel would become the living testimony to the God of judgment and of salvation, and by that testimony, all peoples would be led to worship the Lord.
That is the dialogue that is carried out in this song. The Lord speaks in 52:13-15. Then the foreign nations take up the speech in 53:1-10, and finally God ends the speech in 53:11-12. The foreigners are utterly amazed that the people whom they thought had been rejected by God were instead delivered by that God and raised on high. Israel was as good as dead in exile, and yet God gave her new life. Surely God must have had a purpose for doing such a thing, and the nations realize that Israel went through suffering and death for their sake, that they might be saved.
Second Isaiah is thus calling his people to a missionary task in this poem. But as in all the Old Testament, it is not the task of actively going forth into the world and proclaiming the ways of God. Rather, it is the task of being God's true servant, willing to submit to his will, even unto death. It is the task of truly being God's people, in order that the nations may see God's work in Israel and turn and worship the Lord.
If we were to translate that into our life, our God-given task as the church would be truly to be the church, so dedicated to the service of God that we would be willing to die in order to carry out God's will. We would be willing to give up everything -- our money, our building, our programs, our reputation -- if such sacrifice would further God's purpose of saving all peoples.
There have been Christians who have done that -- Kagawa of Japan, who gave his eyesight and finally his life to live among the poor of Japan; Mother Teresa, who gave up all to take the dying off the streets of India and to comfort them with the love of God in their last days; Martin Luther King, Jr., who braved prison and scorn, police dogs and beatings to turn around the conscience of a nation; Albert Schweitzer, who left a promising career as a musician and theologian to minister to the sick in the jungles of Africa; dozens of women and men who everywhere have given up this world's goods and status to serve Christ in slums and hospices, orphanages and storefront churches across the land. And yes, faithful mothers who spend hours with their disabled or retarded children, and faithful husbands who exhaust themselves in the care of a spouse with Alzheimer's disease. All have been suffering servants of their Lord, willing to surrender everything to serve him.
When you talk to such people, most of them are not joyless, however. Rather, their hope is in God, whom they know will finally say, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you." And such persons are powerful witnesses to the workings of God, aren't they? Like the Suffering Servant drawing all nations to God, faithful souls draw others to him, to find the strength, the hope, the joy that so illumines their faithful lives.
There was One, however, who outdid us all in sacrifice and joy as the Suffering Servant. When the disciples and apostles and authors of the New Testament strained to tell who Jesus Christ is, they could do no other but describe his life and death and resurrection in terms of this Suffering Servant song.
Everywhere throughout the New Testament, the words of this song sound forth. Jesus is the one who gives his life as a ransom for many, says Mark (10:45), and who is silent before his oppressors at his trial (Mark 14:61). Jesus is reckoned with the transgressors, writes Luke (22:37), condemned as a criminal and hung on a cross between two thieves. He is like Second Isaiah's lamb that is led to the slaughter, in the Book of Acts (8:32), but he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, in John (1:29). Jesus' grave is made with a rich man called Joseph of Arimathea (Matthew 27:57-60), yet certainly he had committed no sin and spoken no guile (1 Peter 2:22). And like the nations in the Suffering Servant Song, we have come to realize that our Lord is the one by whose stripes, whose whipping, we were healed when we had all gone astray like sheep (1 Peter 2:24-25).
The final, true servant of God is our Lord Jesus Christ. He became in his death what Israel was always meant to be. His trial and unjust sentence by Pilate, his death on the cross between two robbers, his burial in a borrowed grave fulfilled the words of our prophet. But we must remember why that death took place -- to take upon himself our sins and to suffer the punishment we deserved from God for our evil ways.
On this Good Friday, perhaps we all should adopt the role of the foreign nations in our Servant Song, and confess with them that Jesus "was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed" (Isaiah 53:5). Christ died in our place, taking upon himself our wrong. He gave his life for our sakes that we might not die. For "the wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23), and you and I are sinners.
There was something else, however, that the foreigners realized, according to our passage. They came to understand that "it was the will of the Lord to bruise" the servant, and that it was God who had put the servant "to grief" (v. 10). It was God's will that our Lord Jesus die on the cross of Golgotha. Jesus had prayed in the garden of Gethsemane that, if possible, he not go to the cross. But our Lord realized that such was the will of his Father. And so he gave up his life willingly, because that was the plan of his Father. Not because his God was some sort of abusing Father. Not because God desired vengeance and blood. Heaven help us if those are our thoughts! No, it was the will of God that his Son die on the cross, because God loves us and wants to save us. God took upon himself our sin in the person of his Son. God himself bore our iniquities instead of holding us accountable for them. And that was pure love and pure mercy extended to us by our heavenly Father. Surely, our only response can be the one that we sing in Isaac Watts' great hymn: "Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all."
