The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe…
The Cross: Foreknown… Remembered
Written hundred of years before the advent of the Lord Jesus Christ, the 53rd chapter of Isaiah nevertheless stands as the most vivid Scriptural description of His sorrow, suffering, forsakenness, and death on the cross of Calvary.
“Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted” (Isaiah 53:4).
Note the past tense regarding a future event. The sacrifice of the Lord Jesus was so certain in the heart of God - “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world - the Holy Spirit could inspire the record of what would be, as if it had already been. This speaks to “the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Revelation 13:8; Ephesians 3:11). A cross existed in the heart, mind, and purpose of God before He brought all things into being. From everlasting, He knew that creation would lead to suffering, namely, the untold agony of a breach in the triune relationship that comprises the very being of love in our Lord. The Father would smite the Son at Calvary with untold agony as the Lord Jesus “bore our sins” and was “made to be sin for us” (I Peter 2:24; II Corinthians 5:21). The Father and the Holy Spirit - “My God, My God” - would forsake Him for our sakes, leaving Him to die in an abject loneliness of heart far greater than any physical pain or emotional suffering (Matthew 27:46). All of the horror had been foreknown from everlasting, but nothing changed the inviolable purpose in God’s heart of redeeming love whereby the Lord Jesus “steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem” and the cross that awaited Him there (Luke 9:51).
“Stricken, smitten of God, afflicted.” Let us never pass by the holy and blood-stained ground of Calvary without removing the shoes of our hearts in the realization that we cannot walk thereupon. Our Savior accomplished something there solely without our effort or contribution, something so horrible, something so holy. The prophet foretold of the moment to come as if it had always been. Because it had, in the heart of the God - “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” The moment remains in His heart, remembered whenever a sinner approaches the throne of grace for salvation, or whenever a believer “comes boldly” because we realize the free access made possible by the denial of access to our Lord as He died alone on the cross in the judgment fires of divine wrath (Hebrews 4:16).
A trail of Blood marks the path
leading to the throne,
where God receives the trusting heart
approaching by His Son.
Without the cross, there could not be
this access freely known.
Without such sorrow, pain, and loss,
we’d have nowhere to go.
Yes, every prayer flows to the Throne
on flood tides of Christ’s blood.
We come with grateful, trusting hope,
in wonder of such love…
A trail of Blood marks the path leading to the Throne.
“The eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of Him.”
(Ephesians 3:11)
Weekly Memory Verse
Ye are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you.”
(Romans 8:9)
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