His Heart, My Home

Today, we’re going to broaden the focus of our series on healing to include both our physical and our spiritual salvation. Sin and sickness have always been intertwined, since both are the result of the fall.

All of mankind’s ills: sin, sickness, poverty, and death began at the fall, when Adam and Eve were separated from God’s life by their rebellion. But God, as always, was way ahead of the enemy. He had already formulated the antidote for sin and death, long before the serpent injected his poisonous venom into our original ancestors. His plan that would provide salvation for our whole human nature; spirit, soul, and body.

“But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed.” (Isaiah 53:5, NKJV)

Isaiah 53 is incredibly rich, with gems of multi-layered truths, revelation knowledge, and wisdom in every verse.

We won’t have to dig deeply today, because there are many golden nuggets of truth laying right on the surface of verse 5. Let’s pick up some.

The Hebrew word translated as “wounded” is the word, “chalal.” It means “to wound; to pierce through.” Of course, this refers to Jesus’ physical wounds and the fact that His hands, feet, and side were all pierced through. But this word, “chalal” also means “to pollute; to defile; to profane.”

We don’t usually associate Jesus with the words “pollute, defile, or profane.” But we should, because, although He was perfectly holy, we were polluted, defiled, and profaned by our sin. He willingly identified with us, and took our place, as our Substitute, exchanging His perfect life for our corrupted one. The spotless, sinless, Lamb of God came to take away the sins of the world.

Even though Jesus’ substitutionary sacrifice was universal, for the whole world, it is only when we recognize and receive His sacrifice personally that we discover God’s power to deliver and save us.

He was wounded; He was “pierced through” with my transgressions. The Hebrew word for “transgressions” (pesha) also means “trespasses; rebellion.”

Jesus didn’t just bear our sins. He was pierced through with our sin. He was “made to be our sin.” He took our sin-nature into Himself.

The Bible says it this way in 2 Corinthians 5:21, (The Living Bible) “For God took the sinless Christ, and poured into Him our sins. Then, in exchange, He poured God’s goodness into us!”

Jesus drank the cup of our transgressions, our trespasses and our rebellions. That foul, bitter cup was filled to the brim, and He drank it all, drained it of every last drop!

And because He became our sin, Jesus also drank the cup of God’s wrath against sin. That cup was full-strength, undiluted, and concentrated. The wrath of God which had accumulated since Adam, for the entire human race, was poured out in fury upon the one Man who represented all of us.

Knowing that this was God’s plan, He had cried out in prayer, in the Garden, not once, but twice, “O my Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” (Matthew 26:39,42, NKJV)

The Voice Translation renders Jesus’ prayer as, “Father, this is the last thing I want. If there is any way, please take this bitter cup from me.”

Yet, it had to be. Jesus was pierced through. He was polluted, defiled, and profaned by our transgressions. There was no other way for God to bring us out of the tomb of spiritual death into the His life.

But there’s much more. He was also “bruised” for our “iniquities.” Let’s look at the word iniquity first. This word is not used very much today, so we’ll need to explore a little to understand it.

First, what is the difference between sin and iniquity?

Sin refers to acts of disobedience against God.
Iniquity goes beyond acts of sin and signifies a premeditated and unrepentant commitment to sin. We can see there is a significant difference between careless acts of sin and a commitment to sin.

The Hebrew word translated as “iniquities” in Isaiah 53:5 means, “evil, wickedness, and perversity. What was God’s remedy for our iniquities? Jesus was “bruised” for them.

We’ve all had bruises. They’re really not that painful or serious, and they usually disappear after a few days.

That doesn’t sound like much of a punishment for iniquities, until we study the Hebrew word that is translated as bruised. It is the word “dakah”, and it means, “to crush; to beat to pieces with the intent to destroy.”

The Message translates verse 5 in a way that highlights the brutality of our sin’s effect on Jesus: It says, “But it was our sins…that ripped, and tore, and crushed Him – our sins!”

The crushing process began at the base of the Mount of Olives in a garden where Jesus often went to pray.

The garden was known as Gethsemane, which in Hebrew literally means “to press” (Gat) + “oils” (shemanim). This was the place where the farmers from the countryside surrounding Jerusalem would bring their harvested olives to be pressed into oil. Large stones were used to roll over the olives, crushing them to pieces. The olive oil, pressed out, would then be poured into vessels.

How ironic that the first Adam and the last Adam both changed mankind’s destiny in a Garden setting. The first Adam, by His disobedience, set humanity’s feet upon the path of sin and death. The last Adam, by His perfect obedience to God’s will, set our feet on the path to eternal life.

It was here in Gethsemane, that Jesus began to feel the weight and pressure of our sin and spiritual death. As Jesus prayed, the life began to be squeezed out of Him.

The scripture says, “And being in agony (deeply distressed and anguished almost to the point of death), He prayed more intently; and His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down on the ground. (Luke 22:44, Amplified Bible)

Medical science tells us that it is possible that Jesus experienced a condition known as hematidrosis, a rare medical phenomenon in which individuals sweat blood. This occurs when small blood vessels around the sweat glands burst under extreme stress, causing blood to flow out of the pores.

As He surrendered completely to the Father’s will, He was strengthened by an angel for the suffering ahead. Jesus accepted that He would be totally crushed under the immense weight of our sins, trespasses, iniquities, guilt, shame, dishonor, sicknesses, disease, and infirmities.

All of it, His pain, His humiliation, His suffering, and His death was all for our redemption. The Bible tells us it actually “pleased” the Father to “bruise” His beloved Son, the one in whom He was “well-pleased.” (Isaiah 53:10 and Mark 1:11)

Why? Isaiah 53:11 tells us that God considered all that He and Jesus suffered to be worth it, to bring us into His family! “He shall see the labor of His soul, and be satisfied. By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, For He shall bear their iniquities.”

Finishing Isaiah 53:5, “…the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. “

The chastisement (punishment; discipline) Jesus endured provided peace (soundness; wholeness) to our souls (our minds, wills and emotions). We could never have known peace without Jesus sacrificing Himself to give us right-standing with God.

Hebrews 12:11, Amplified Bible says, ” For the time being, no discipline brings joy, but seems sad and painful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness (right-standing with God and a lifestyle and attitude that seeks conformity to God’s will and purpose.)”

(Isaiah 32:17, Amplified Classic) “And the effect of righteousness will be peace [internal and external], and the result of righteousness will be quietness and confident trust forever.”

Jesus, absolutely obtained our eternal (internal and external) salvation, spirit, soul and body!

He was wounded and pierced for our trans-gressions. He was bruised and crushed for our iniquities. That is SALVATION for our SPIRITS!

The chastisement for our peace was upon Him. That is SALVATION for our SOULS (mind, will, and emotions)!

And by His stripes we are healed. That is SALVATION for our BODIES!

What a loving, kind, and merciful Father! What a perfect salvation! What an awesome Savior!