I have already referred to the fact that the word rendered 'son' ought
rather to be rendered 'servant.' It literally means 'child' or 'boy,'
and appears to have been used familiarly, just in the same fashion as
we use the same expression 'boy,' or its equivalent 'maid,' as a more
gentle designation for a servant. Thus the kindly centurion, when he
would bespeak our Lord's care for his menial, calls him his 'boy'; and
our Bible there translates rightly 'servant.'
Again, the designation is that which is continually employed in the
Greek translation of the Old Testament as the equivalent for the
well-known prophetic phrase 'the Servant of Jehovah,' which, as you
will remember, is characteristic of the second portion of the
prophecies of Isaiah. And consequently we find that, in a quotation of
Isaiah's prophecy in the Gospel of Matthew, the very phrase of our text
is there employed: 'Behold My Servant whom I uphold!'
Now, it seems as if this designation of our Lord as God's Servant was
very familiar to Peter's thoughts at this stage of the development of
Christian doctrine. For we find the name employed twice in this
discourse--in the thirteenth verse, 'the God of our Fathers hath
glorified His Servant Jesus,' and again in my text. We also find it
twice in the next chapter, where Peter, offering up a prayer amongst
his brethren, speaks of 'Thy Holy Child Jesus,' and prays 'that signs
and wonders may be done through the name' of that 'Holy Child.' So,
then, I think we may fairly take it that, at the time in question, this
thought of Jesus as the 'Servant of the Lord' had come with especial
force to the primitive Church. And the fact that the designation never
occurs again in the New Testament seems to show that they passed on
from it into a deeper perception than even it attests of who and what
this Jesus was in relation to God.
But, at all events, we have in our text the Apostle looking back to
that dim, mysterious Figure which rises up with shadowy lineaments out
of the great prophecy of 'Isaiah,' and thrilling with awe and wonder,
as he sees, bit by bit, in the Face painted on the prophetic canvas,
the likeness of the Face into which he had looked for three blessed
years, that now began to tell him more than they had done whilst their
moments were passing.
'The Servant of the Lord'--that means, first of all, that Christ, in
all which He does, meekly and obediently executes the Father's will. As
He Himself said, 'I come not to do Mine own will, but the will of Him
that sent Me.' But it carries us further than that, to a point about
which I would like to say one word now; and that is, the clear
recognition that the very centre of Jewish prophecy is the revelation
of the personality of the Christ. Now, it seems to me that present
tendencies, discussions about the nature and limits of inspiration,
investigations which, in many directions, are to be welcomed and are
fruitful as to the manner of origin of the books of the Old Testament,
and as to their collection into a Canon and a whole--that all this new
light has a counterbalancing disadvantage, in that it tends somewhat to
obscure in men's minds the great central truth about the revelation of
God in Israel--viz. that it was all progressive, and that its goal and
end was Jesus Christ. 'The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of
prophecy,' and however much we may have to learn--and I have no doubt
that we have a great deal to learn, about the composition, the
structure, the authorship, the date of these ancient books--I take
leave to say that the unlearned reader, who recognises that they all
converge on Jesus Christ, has hold of the clue of the labyrinth, and
has come nearer to the marrow of the books than the most learned
investigators, who see all manner of things besides in them, and do not
see that 'they that went before cried, saying, Hosanna! Blessed be He
that cometh in the name of the Lord!'
And so I venture to commend to you, brethren--not as a barrier against
any reverent investigation, not as stopping any careful study--this as
the central truth concerning the ancient revelation, that it had, for
its chief business, to proclaim the coming of the Servant of Jehovah,
Jesus the Christ.
III. And now, lastly, look at these words as setting forth the true
centre of Christ's work.
'He has sent Him to bless you in turning away every one of you from his
iniquities.' I have already spoken about the gross, narrow, carnal
apprehensions of Messiah's work which cleaved to the disciples during
all our Lord's life here, and which disturbed even the sanctity of the
upper chamber at that last meal, with squabbles about precedence which
had an eye to places in the court of the Messiah when He assumed His
throne. But here Peter has shaken himself clear of all these, and has
grasped the thought that, whatever derivative and secondary blessings
of an external and visible sort may, and must, come in Messiah's train,
_the_ blessing which He brings is of a purely spiritual and inward
character, and consists in turning away single souls from their love
and practice of evil. That is Christ's true work.
The Apostle does not enlarge as to how it is done. We know how it is
done. Jesus turns away men from sin because, by the magnetism of His
love, and the attractive raying out of influence from His Cross, He
turns them to Himself. He turns us from our iniquities by the expulsive
power of a new affection, which, coming into our hearts like a great
river into some foul Augean stable, sweeps out on its waters all the
filth that no broom can ever clear out in detail. He turns men from
their iniquities by His gift of a new life, kindred with that from
which it is derived.
There is an old superstition that lightning turned whatever it struck
towards the point from which the flash came, so that a tree with its
thousand leaves had each of them pointed to that quarter in the heavens
where the blaze had been.
And so Christ, when He flings out the beneficent flash that slays only
our evil, and vitalises ourselves, turns us to Him, and away from our
transgressions. 'Turn us, O Christ, and we shall be turned.'
Ah, brethren! that is the blessing that we need most, for 'iniquities'
are universal; and so long as man is bound to his sin it will embitter
all sweetnesses, and neutralise every blessing. It is not culture,
valuable as that is in many ways, that will avail to stanch man's
deepest wounds. It is not a new social order that will still the
discontent and the misery of humanity. You may adopt collective
economic and social arrangements, and divide property out as it pleases
you. But as long as man continues selfish he will continue sinful, and
as long as he continues sinful _any_ social order will be pregnant with
sorrow, 'and when it is finished it will bring forth death.' You have
to go deeper down than all that, down as deep as this Apostle goes in
this sermon of his, and recognise that Christ's prime blessing is the
turning of men from their iniquities, and that only after that has been
done will other good come.
How shallow, by the side of that conception, do modern notions of Jesus
as the great social Reformer look! These are true, but they want their
basis, and their basis lies only here, that He is the Redeemer of
individuals from their sins. There were people in Christ's lifetime who
were all untouched by His teachings, but when they found that He gave
bread miraculously they said, 'This is of a truth the Prophet! That's
the prophet for my money; the Man that can make bread, and secure
material well-being.' Have not certain modern views of Christ's work
and mission a good deal in common with these vulgar old Jews--views
which regard Him mainly as contributing to the material good, the
social and economical well-being of the world?
Now, I believe that He does that. And I believe that Christ's
principles are going to revolutionise society as it exists at present.
But I am sure that we are on a false scent if we attempt to preach
consequences without proclaiming their antecedents, and that such
preaching will end, as all such attempts have ended, in confusion and
disappointment.
They used to talk about Jesus Christ, in the first French Revolution,
as 'the Good _Sansculotte_.' Perfectly true! But as the basis of that,
and of all representations of Him, that will have power on the diseases
of the community, we have to preach Him as the Saviour of the
individual from his sin.
And so, brethren, has He saved you? Do you begin your notions of Jesus
Christ where His work begins? Do you feel that what you want most is
neither culture nor any superficial and external changes, but something
that will deal with the deep, indwelling, rooted, obstinate self-regard
which is the centre of all sin? And have you gone alone to Him as a
sinful man? As the Apostle here suggests, Jesus Christ does not save
communities. The doctor has his patients into the consulting-room one
by one. There is no applying of Christ's benefits to men in batches, by
platoons and regiments, as Clovis baptized his Franks; but you have to
go, every one of you, through the turnstile singly, and alone to
confess, and alone to be absolved, and alone to be turned, from your
iniquity.
If I might venture to alter the position of words in my text, I would
lay them, so modified, on the hearts of all my friends whom my words
may reach now, and say, 'Unto you--_unto thee_, God, having raised up
His Son Jesus, sent Him to bless you, _first_ in turning away every one
of you from his iniquities.'