The Great Exchange
“…he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many” (Isaiah 53:12)
Maximilian Kolbe was a Polish Priest who, during the Second World War, spoke out against the Nazi regime and offered protection and shelter to many Jewish people in the monastery in which he lived. In 1941 he was arrested by the Gestapo and eventually sent to the concentration camp at Auschwitz. In July of that year, it was reported that three prisoners had escaped from the camp. In retaliation, and as a warning for others, the prison authorities selected 10 prisoners to be isolated and starved. When this plan was announced and 10 men selected to die, one of the condemned prisoners cried out, ‘My wife! My children!’ Kolbe, who had no wife or children, immediately volunteered to take the man’s place. The other man was given reprieve, and Kolbe was eventually executed.
It is an amazing thing for one person to give their life for another. Isaiah 53 speaks to the glorious truth that the Son of God died in our place at Calvary. It speaks of this great exchange by using the imagery of sheep for both the Lord’s Servant and ourselves. We are like sheep in our stubbornness in refusing direction. Although we are God’s creatures—His people—we have refused to live under His rule. Verse 6 explains, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way”. Sheep are prone to wander – prone to do stupid things – and Isaiah wants us to see that we’re just the same. A few years ago, the global press reported the unusual story of about 1500 sheep in Van province in Turkey walking over the edge of a cliff. Apparently, one sheep took it upon himself to wander over the edge of the cliff, and about 1499 of his closest friends just went right ahead and followed his lead – one after another.
The life cycle of sheep involves some years of wandering and requiring shepherding, and it generally ends with the poor animal facing the slaughter. But only half of that lifecycle belongs to us in Isaiah’s prophecy. We go astray like sheep – we are guilty of iniquity—but we are spared the death that rightly belongs to us. The Lord’s Servant dies for us and in our place. As verse 5 states, “he was pierced for our transgressions he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace” (emphasis added). It is this glorious truth that is celebrated in Charles Wesley’s famous lyrics, “Amazing love! How can it be? That Thou, my God, should die for me!” Indeed, the Lord’s Servant steps into the place of the sheep and, without objection and complaint, faces the agony of “oppression” (verse 8) and death. As verse 7 states, “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter….like a sheep that before its shearers is silent…he opened not his mouth.”
Amazingly, Isaiah 53 notes of the wrongly crucified Son of God that “out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied” (verse 11). How can the exchange of a perfect, faithful Lamb for sinful, unfaithful sheep bring about any measure of satisfaction? The answer is that death will not be the end for the “despised and rejected” (verse 3) Servant of the Lord. In fact, his death will be the means of bringing life to many who will become his family – his spiritual descendants. Verse 10 hints at this promise of life: “He shall see his offspring” and be satisfied that His death will “make many to be accounted righteous” (verse 11). P.P. Bliss captures well these glorious truths surrounding the crucifixion of the “man of sorrows…acquainted with grief” (verse 3) in the following stanzas:
“Man of sorrows, what a name
For the Son of God, who came.
Ruined sinners to reclaim:
Hallelujah, what a Savior!
Bearing shame and scoffing rude,
In my place condemned he stood,
Sealed my pardon with his blood:
Hallelujah, what a Savior!
Guilty, helpless, lost were we;
Blameless Lamb of God was he,
Sacrificed to set us free:
Hallelujah, what a Savior!
He was lifted up to die;
‘It is finished’ was his cry;
Now in heaven exalted high:
Hallelujah, what a Savior!
When he comes, our glorious King,
All his ransomed home to bring,
Then anew this song we’ll sing:
Hallelujah, what a Savior!”