BY HIS WOUNDS WE ARE HEALED
Isaiah 53:4-12
10/26/03
Been sick lately? And when I say, “sick,” I mean, have you had a cold, the flu, depression, maybe, or illnesses that come with aging? Did you know that the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ heals all your sicknesses as well as taking you to heaven one day? When Jesus died He took away our sins, but He also took our sicknesses and illnesses and diseases as well.
In Isaiah 53:4 we are told, “Surely he has borne our infirmities and carried our diseases; yet we accounted him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted.”
A good tool to have in addition to your Bible is a concordance. Some friends bought us this one as a wedding gift. At the time, I thought it was a pretty strange gift but now I couldn’t live without it. They do make these in smaller editions, if the size of this one intimidates you.
A concordance will take a word you are looking for in the Bible and list all of the verses where that word appears, so when you know a verse but can’t find it in the Bible, you can look up one of the words in the verse and find it.
In addition to each word it also has a number beside it which takes you to the back section and gives you the Greek or Hebrew word and it’s meaning in that language. So, looking at the word, “infirmities,” the Hebrew author, Isaiah, meant disease, illness, sickness, and weakness.
By his death and resurrection, Jesus bore our diseases, illnesses and weaknesses. Verse 5 says, “But he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed.
Here we have more of those big, Bible words that sound strange to us in our modern worlds. Transgressions…iniquities…Once again, turning to the Greek word in the concordance tells us our transgressions include our sins, offenses, and rebellion. And iniquities? That means our sins, wickedness and guilt.
The last words of verse 5, “by his bruises we are healed,” is also commonly translated as “by his stripes we are healed.” Two thousand years ago in the Roman Empire it was customary to whip criminals with an instrument called a "Cat O’ Nine Tails." This whip had pieces of stone, bone and broken glass imbedded into the ends of the strips of leather used to beat the criminal. When a person was beaten with this whip the beating alone was often enough to kill the criminal. The word, “stripes” indicates the welts made on the criminal’s back by the flogging.
The customary number of stripes given with this whip was 40 minus one. The Roman soldiers considered it an act of mercy to deduct one stripe from the prisoner. The interesting thing about this is that, according to a medical journal, there are 39 root causes for every disease on the earth. Jesus was beaten with this whip 39 times. Jesus bore our sicknesses spiritually (as sin), physically (as all the various physical ills we suffer) and even mentally (as in guilt). He took on all of this for us!
Verse 6: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have all turned to our own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” We have all gone astray; we have all given in to our own desires and rebellion. God laid on the back of Jesus not only our sins and wickedness, but also the guilt we feel about our rebellions and when we sin. Because of Jesus, we don’t even have to feel guilty.
We are healed. When Jesus died two thousand years ago He took your sicknesses, your diseases and your sins. For every stripe, every painful cut, every bruise Jesus took, He also took the root cause for every physical or mental illness that you would ever encounter. You are healed! It is finished! You can’t get healed because you were already healed at the cross, thousands of years before you were even born!
Just so we have a clear picture from the Word of God concerning this thought of Jesus bearing our sickness and disease let’s look at Matthew chapter 8:16-17: “That evening they brought to (Jesus) many who were possessed with demons; and he cast out the spirits with a word, and cured all who were sick. This was to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah, ‘He took our infirmities and bore our diseases.”
Isaiah. Matthew quotes what Isaiah prophesied about Christ in the text we are looking at this morning.
As I was studying these verses, I noted that Isaiah said that Jesus bore our transgressions and iniquities and infirmities—our sins, rebellion, wickedness, guilt, and our diseases and illnesses. But Matthew only quoted what Isaiah said about Jesus taking our diseases and illnesses. Do you suppose that because Matthew knew Jesus was without sin, he couldn’t even consider him taking our sins upon Him? This Savior, this human being who had no sins of his own to bear, did indeed die for the sins of all humankind!
Now there’s a twist here. Matthew mentions Jesus taking our physical illnesses and diseases but doesn’t mention Jesus taking our sins. Yet today, many people are willing to believe that Jesus bore our sins. But how many of us actually believe he paid the price at the cross to assume our physical sicknesses as well? With this kind of logic, if we don’t believe He took our sicknesses at the cross then maybe He didn’t take our sins either! Just as Jesus paid the price for our sins by dying, he also bore all the sickness and disease you would ever have in this lifetime. He took them all away at the cross!
Maybe we often question the validity of healing in the work of Jesus Christ because there are so many sick people in the world. Let me ask you, are there lost people in the world, people who have not ever confessed any sin at all? And does that mean that Jesus didn’t provide something for them in the work of the cross? Of course He did!
The key thing to activating these truths in your life is faith (believing it is true) and confessing it with your mouth.
Romans 10:8-10 says, “The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart (that is, the word of faith we proclaim); because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved.”
This tells us that salvation is as close as your mouth and heart. People sometimes think it must be a complicated process, but it isn’t! You see faith beginning in your heart after you have heard the Word of God concerning a subject. The natural response after you believe something is to speak it out of your mouth.
The next time you get sick and someone asks you how you feel, listen to yourself as you say "Oh, I feel terrible, I am sooo sick!"
It’s interesting to note that the word we translated as, “saved,” used twice in this Romans passage, actually uses two different words in the Greek. When you believe it in your heart, that word “saved” means healed. When you add confession with your mouth, “saved” means salvation, or eternal life.
I’ve heard many people question the validity of Christ’s healing using the reason "But if healing is valid then why are there so many good people in the world that are sick?" Let me ask you, why are there so many good and moral people in the world that don’t have a relationship with God? Why are there so many good people who will never see heaven? Because they don’t believe the good news of what Jesus has done for them! Because they do not believe it in their hearts, let alone confess with their mouths!
This is the reason the apostle Paul said, “…we walk by faith, not by sight.” (2 Corinthians 5:7)
You see, the Christian life is a walk of faith even when we don’t see or feel something, even when we are physically ill. It is so important not to trust our personal feelings, our circumstances or any other thing that disagrees with what God has said in His Word. God says that He has healed you. This is something you must simply believe, whether you have a cold, depression, or cancer.
”Surely he has borne our infirmities and carried our diseases; yet we accounted him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have all turned to our own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:4-6)
We use faith every day. Every time you flip the light switch on in your house you believe in something you can’t see! Have you ever seen the electricity that goes through the wires and makes a light bulb burn? No! Why do you believe that when you flip the switch something will happen? There are 2 reasons you believe.
1. Someone told you it would
2. You’ve tried it yourself and found out that it works
Many of our illnesses are the consequences of our sins, the way we live or eat. Many of our illnesses are the consequences of the world we live in, cancer-causing pollution, and once again, the sins we have committed against our environment, which God originally created perfect. These kinds of illnesses can also be healed by faith, if Jesus chooses to do so and if by healing, it won’t be against the natural order of the universe which God planned.
Kathleen Norris, the author of “Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith” writes, “We know that marriages, families, communities, nations often come together and discover their true strength when some apocalypse - some new revelation of the fault lines in our lives - has occurred. Hospital chaplains see this all the time. For some reason, we human beings seem to learn best how to love when we're a bit broken, when our plans fall apart, when our myths of our self-sufficiency and goodness and safety are shattered. Apocalypse is meant to bring us to our senses, allowing us a sobering, and usually painful, glimpse of what is possible in the new life we build from the ashes of the old.” The Bible also explains one other way of tapping into God’s grace and blessings: anointing with oil. When illness is deeply influenced by spiritual and emotional conditions, by separation from loved ones, by loss or by a sense of guilt, anointing can bring a restoration of wholeness and health.
Anyone here today who desires healing and wholeness, strengthening of your faith or forgiveness of sins may ask for anointing right now by coming forward. Jesus performed some of his greatest miracles of healing because of the faith of His people. Come forward! Walk by faith!
BENEDICTION: May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you. (2 Corinthians 13:13)
Sources:
Kathleen Norris, Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith (New York: Riverhead Books, 1998), 321.
Paul Rupe, article “Help for the Healer”
