'Revealed' in His Suffering

eDevotion

Encouragement for your daily walk with God

We are fast approaching the “High Holy Days” of the Christian calendar. They center on the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus—the price that was paid for our sin. As I was working on my sermons for Palm Sunday, Good Friday, and Resurrection Sunday, my attention was drawn to John’s Gospel where he quoted a passage from Isaiah. In it, he talked about the “arm of the Lord being ‘revealed.’”

I’ve often used that passage in the sense of strength and power, as in the idea of rolling up your sleeves to get to work. But as I focused on the Isaiah passage a different understanding began to unfold. It has to do with the the Hebrew word gah-lah’ translated revealed.

It really is a word that describes the ultimate price that Messiah would pay for the sins of the world. How so? Well, gah-lah’ has a negative connotation, not a positive one. It is a primitive root; to denude [especially in a disgraceful sense]. It was used of those who were exiled—stripped, and carried away as a captive. So the Lord was not simply ‘revealed‘ to us, He was stripped, humiliated, and deeply degraded in order to save us. The price He paid was unfathomable.

As you begin to turn your mind toward the Holy Days, remember the Lord's sufferings. It will help to keep you humble, spiritually honest, and prepare you for your own small share of sufferings. It will also keep your heart tender toward Him, as well as everyone else for whom He ‘revealed’ Himself to save.

While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light." These things Jesus spoke, and departed, and was hidden from them. But although He had done so many signs before them, they did not believe in Him, that the word of Isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled, which he spoke: "Lord, who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?" John 12:36-38