Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. (Isaiah 53: 4-5)

The Book of Isaiah was written the second half of the 8th century BC. It is divided into 66 chapters. The first 39 chapters center on Isaiah prophesies of the coming downfall of a sinful, rebellious Judah lost in idolatry and unfaithfulness. Isaiah picks up on a theme used by other prophets and declares that Judah is being unfaithful – he compares her to a wife who is committing adultery, having run away from her true husband.

The last 27 chapters prophesy the coming of the Messiah and the restoration of the Israel. This section includes the prophesies of the Suffering Servant.

Isaiah makes it clear that God is the only true god. God is the God of the entire world. Furthermore, no one can defeat God; if God's people suffer defeat in battle, it is only because God permits it to happen as a result of their unfaithfulness. God has called Judah and Israel his covenant people for the specific purpose of teaching the world about him. Furthermore, God is ultimately concerned with more than the Jewish people.

A final thematic goal that Isaiah constantly leans toward throughout the writing is the coming of the Messiah, who he describes as the "Suffering Servant", whose life and atoning death will lead to the establishment of God's kingdom, with rulers and subjects who will live by the will of God.

In our Old Testament reading for today the prophet Isaiah gives us a detailed description of the life, ministry and atoning death of this coming "Suffering Servant", who we understand is the coming Messiah. "He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all."

This is seen as a prophetic passage concerning the atoning work of Jesus Christ. Isaiah prophesies many things concerning the Messiah's ministry and all that He would go through on behalf of God's people, of which we find healing being very much a part of the atoning work of Christ.

We can see in these verses that there are three very bold affirmative statements Scripture that refer to healing of our sins being a part of the atoning work of Christ.

1. Verse four: He has borne our griefs - The word griefs means sicknesses, weaknesses and diseases.
2. Verse five: by His stripes we are healed - this includes emotional and being physically healed as well.
3. Verse ten: He has put Him to grief - The Amplified version says, "He has put Him to grief and made Him sick."

The Testimony of Jesus Fulfilling the Atonement is found in many places in the New Testament.

Matthew 8:16-17 very plainly illustrates to us that Jesus fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah 53 when He healed all who came unto Him. It says, "He took our infirmities and bore our griefs, literally, in the Greek, bore our sicknesses."

• Jesus was committed to healing all because of the covenant.
• In Jesus' mind, healing and forgiveness were equal.
• St. Paul, writing about Christ, said "He who knew no sin, became as [like] sin for us."

In His miracles, Jesus heals the body that men might understand He can heal the soul. Being healed of physical illness is simply the salvation of Jesus Christ having its divine action in a man's body the same as it has its divine action in a man's soul. But the mortal nature of man, death, is a permanent consequence of the Fall of man. Ultimate healing is not in this life, but in eternal life with Christ. Paul writes "As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive." It is thus very important to understand that salvation is all about healing – healing of the soul.

The Greek words for salvation or saved show that healing is a part of the atonement. "Sozo" (verb) and "Soteria" (noun) are the two Greek words that are used for the term salvation or saved. They are also translated healed, healing, made whole, preserved, etc.

In the same way that we still deal with sin, even though Christ provided the perfect atonement , we still deal with sickness even though it has been provided for in the atonement. When I sin, I don't say, "It must be God's will that I continue to sin just because I haven't got the victory over a particular sin." I do what the apostle Paul exhorted in Philippians. I continue to press towards the mark of the high calling in Jesus Christ, praying for the perseverance to do so, knowing that in my own weakness I cannot do so. Being a Christian means that we believe that with God all things are possible, and that in Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit that which we cannot do can be accomplished in us by His grace and mercy.

In this sense, I am always still being saved, still being healed, even though my salvation was accomplished as far as God is concerned, on the cross of Calvary. But at this moment I am not perfected in my salvation, I am not an ex-sinner, but a recovering sinner.

In our Psalm David laments that there is not one godly man left. In context, David would include himself. Yet the psalmist makes it clear that this is not the fault of God, but rather that "the faithful are minished from among the children of men". Minished¹ means diminished. John Neale, 19th century Anglican theologian explains that the word faithful is rendered from a Hebrew word that literally means "the truths" are "minished" , which is an archaic form of diminished. When used here, it means that "the faithful" (those who represent "the truths" [of God]) have allowed themselves to be subverted or cowed by the rest of the culture.

Thus David complains of the deceitfulness and wickedness of the proud who refuse to conform to God's will "With our tongue we will prevail, we are they who ought to speak; who is Lord over us?"

St. Paul in our lesson from the Epistle to the Ephesians therefore calls his readers back from the siren calls of the world to strive for holiness by what the bible calls the process of sanctification. In Ephesians 5 we read: "Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children; And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savor. But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints; Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. Be not ye therefore partakers with them. For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: (For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) Proving what is acceptable unto the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret. But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light: for whatsoever doth make manifest is light. Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light."

Left to ourselves we can never hope to achieve this, we can only be made holy by the mercy of God through the atoning sacrifice of Christ. "Christ shall give thee light". The answers to the world's evil cannot come from man: the faithful themselves are all too often minished by conformity top the world. Most of God's own chosen people rejected his Son. But those who turn to Him in faith are healed by His suffering on their behalf. We thus have the answer to David's lament, and as he prophecies in Psalm 12, it is through the Word of God. In this case both Christ as the "living word" and reliance upon the written word found in these words of St. Paul in Ephesians and all through-out the New Testament.

In Christ, by the power of His atonement, we are not under condemnation because of our shortcomings, our imperfections, our sins. Rather, in faith and repentance, at our baptism we die to sin and are resurrected to the promise of new life. But the victory is never complete in this life. Rather we are called to keep pressing forward, working out our faith in what Scripture calls "fear and trembling". Not fear of the world, or fear of death, for the word fear as used in the "faith and fear of the Lord". The word means "deep respect" Because we strive in faith to keep pressing forward, what the Bible calls perseverance, we eventually fully obtain the victory over the world the flesh and the devil that is in Christ. In chapter one of the First Epistle of John we read: "Moreover, this is the message which we have heard from him, and declare to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say, that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and obey not the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light; we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. My little children, these things I write to you, that you may not sin. Yet, if any one has sinned, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Just One. And he is a propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the whole world." The word 'propitiation' is from a Greek word that means "that which atones" Propitiation is the work of Jesus Christ on the cross, by which He fulfills the wrath of God (both an emotional response of anger and a moral response of indignation), and conciliates Him who would otherwise be offended by our sin and would demand that we pay the penalty for it. This concept of propitiation is substitution and imputes righteousness to those who believe in Christ.

Anglican theologian John Stott writes that propitiation "does not make God gracious...God does not love us because Christ died for us, [rather] Christ died for us because God loves us", Calvin² quoting Augustine. On John's Gospel (cx.6), Calvin writes, "Our being reconciled by the death of Christ must not be understood as if the Son reconciled us, in order that the Father, then hating, might begin to love us³".

God did not love us because Christ came and died for us. For God always has loved us. But the sickness of sin had permanently separated fallen man from a Holy God apart from the work of Christ on the cross. For a God of complete righteousness and complete justice and complete holiness to merely wink at sin would make God inconsistent and unholy. God would cease to be God and would be condoning sin, even participating in sin just as Adam condoned and participated in sin. This is impossible for God As we said earlier, sin is seen as a sickness in the Bible. So we could also say, "if we say he have no sickness in us, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us, but if we confess that we are ill, he is faithful and will heal our sickness." In Christ we are healed and reconciled to God.

Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

¹A Commentary on the Psalms, Vol. 1, on the meaning of "minished", p 174; John M. Neale
²The Cross of Christ, p 174; John Calvin
³Institutes of the Christian Religion, (Institutes, II:16:4); John Calvin