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Guest (Female): Welcome to PowerPoint with Jack Graham. What we see in Isaiah chapter 53 is known as a Messianic prophecy. It is as though Isaiah himself is standing at the foot of the cross, and he gives us a clear picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. On today's PowerPoint, Dr. Graham brings a message about the lengths to which God went so you could find healing. Now here's Dr. Graham with his message, The Gospel of Isaiah.

Jack Graham: Let me ask you a question today. How many gospels are in the Bible? Well, you might say four: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. And you would be wrong because there is only one gospel in the Bible. All 66 books of the Bible proclaim the gospel, all of it from beginning to end, from Genesis to Revelation. It's all about Him.

Jesus is the story of the Bible, and the story of the Bible is Jesus. One day, Jesus was walking after his resurrection with two disciples on a road to Emmaus. As they were walking, they were downtrodden and discouraged. They thought it was over, as Christ had died on the cross. Jesus walked beside them for a few moments, and in Luke 24, He says, "And beginning with Moses and the prophets, He interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself."

Peter tells us in the book of Acts that all of the prophets witnessed to Jesus. All of the prophets, all of the patriarchs, all of the apostles witness to Christ. I'm not ashamed of this gospel. I'm not ashamed to simply be a gospel preacher. I make no apology for preaching Christ and His cross and His resurrection.

I don't worry that this message is outdated or outmoded or irrelevant, especially in view of the breakdown of our culture, the breakdown of our world, the breakdown of the family, and the breakdown of personal lives. In fact, it is so relevant we need a brand new burst of gospel preaching in the kingdom and across the church of the Lord Jesus today. I say with the Apostle Paul, "I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek."

Isaiah, the prince of the prophets, preached the gospel of Jesus. Turn with me to Isaiah 53. What we see in Isaiah chapter 53 is known as a Messianic prophecy, and it is of invaluable importance to us because it points to Jesus as the Messiah, who He is and what He came to do. It is as though, even though it was written 750 years before Christ, it is as though Isaiah himself is standing at the foot of the cross, and he gives us a clear picture of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Isaiah speaks of the incarnation, which means God in the flesh, God becoming a man. He describes this Messiah who would come as being a tender root in dry ground. What does dry ground produce? Typically nothing. In the dry ground of a virgin's womb, God conceived His only begotten Son. This is an allusion, therefore, to the virgin birth of Christ. In Isaiah 7:14, Isaiah has already told us that a virgin would conceive and bring forth a son.

Many people in his day had a big problem with Jesus because He claimed to be God. Ultimately, it put Jesus on the cross, this claim of deity. Describing blasphemy, the death sentence for Jesus was the fact that He dared to say, "I am God. I am the Messiah." The problem with Jesus then and the problem with Jesus now is that you can talk about religion and spirituality and church all you want, but you really start nailing the message of Jesus and watch the problems develop with your friends, your family, and others.

Jesus is still despised and rejected for who He claimed to be. He would not be despised if He were just considered a teacher or a moral authority, but the claims of Christ set Him apart and distinguish Him. The exclusive gospel of Jesus Christ, who said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life," sets people apart, and that message, therefore, that Messiah, is despised. Isaiah saw through the tunnel of time and the testimony of God's Spirit that the savior, the Messiah, would come and be born like a tender root in dry ground.

Many did not understand. They were expecting a religious zealot, someone who would overthrow the tyranny of their oppressors. The Jewish people in particular believed that the Messiah would deliver them physically from their bondage. But Jesus did not come the first time as a sovereign deliverer, but rather a spiritual deliverer and a healer and a savior to die, the suffering servant.

We're told that He was a man of sorrows. He wept at the tomb of his friend Lazarus. In Matthew chapter 23, we're told as He was approaching the cross and had set his face to die on the cross, He overlooked the city of Jerusalem that had rejected Him. He sobbed, and the word picture given to us there in Matthew's gospel is that He heaved with deep sobs within. He wept, and He cried out, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often I would have gathered your children as a hen would gather her chicks under her wings, but you would not."

He was rejected. He came in humiliation. He came in incarnation. But of course, the primary thrust of this passage we see in his crucifixion. As I said, it is as though Isaiah was standing at the cross. Jesus died for our sins as the servant of God, the sacrifice for our sins. Isaiah 53 verses 4 through 6 say, "Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; and upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed." The disease of sin is healed by the stripes of our Lord.

Guest (Female): You're listening to PowerPoint with Jack Graham and the message "The Gospel of Isaiah". Be sure to sign up to receive Dr. Graham's daily video devotional on the "Seven Words from the Cross". This powerful study will remind you of the sacrifice Jesus made so that we can be forgiven of our sins and reconciled to God. Dr. Graham will share a short devotional about the final words that Jesus spoke from the cross and what they mean to us today. To sign up, text CROSS to 59789. It's absolutely free to join, so text CROSS to 59789.

Right now, you have an incredible opportunity to help someone experience the hope and truth of Jesus Christ. Thanks to an exciting $150,000 matching grant, your gifts this month will be doubled to help proclaim God's word even farther through PowerPoint Ministries. As our way of saying thank you, we'd love to send you Dr. Graham's book, "Help", a powerful resource showing you how Jesus meets you in your struggles with strength, comfort, and hope. Text MAR to 59789 to give today. Again, that's MAR to 59789. Now, let's get back to today's message, "The Gospel of Isaiah".

Jack Graham: When I first began learning to share my faith, even as a young pastor, I was taught to deliver the message of the gospel one-on-one through Evangelism Explosion. There's a little illustration in there that describes just what we read: "The Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all."

You see, there is a predicament that must be resolved in the human situation, and here is that predicament. God loves you. He loves you with an everlasting love. He loves you perfectly. He will never stop loving you. And because God loves you, He wants you to know Him in a personal way and experience this relationship with Him. But God is also just. God is holy. And because God is just and holy and sovereign, because He reigns and because He rules the universe, He must punish sin. Sin violates the nature and the character of God. As a matter of fact, the Bible says He is of purer eyes than to behold or to even look upon iniquity.

So God is love, but God is holy, and He must punish sin. How on earth can this problem be resolved? The predicament is resolved in the person of Christ and the plan of God that Isaiah and the scriptures reveal. The Lord laid on Him our iniquities.

Let's presume that this Bible is the record book of your life and of your sin. Did you know the Bible tells us that God has books and that He's keeping a record? Every sin that I've ever committed, every sin that you've ever committed is in this book, the record of sin. All the sin of humanity is in the record book of sin, the sin of the world weighing mankind down, weighing me and you down because all of us have sinned. If I bear this sin, ultimately, it will carry me to judgment and hell.

But the Bible says, Isaiah's gospel tells us, the Lord laid on Him the iniquity of us all. Jesus took it all on his back at the cross. From the beating of Christ by a Roman soldier who would take the Roman lictor, they would fasten the victim to a pole, and there, with long leather straps embedded with bone and metal, a psychopathic Roman soldier would lacerate the back of his victim, tearing the flesh from the bones, breaking through the arteries. It was a bloody, violent mess.

Many never even survived the beating, much less the crucifixion. The beating in itself, the flogging, the scourging of a criminal as Christ was accused of being a criminal, was in itself a functional crucifixion. But then to carry the beam of the cross, the cross to be fastened to it, to be nailed in the small, soft part of the hand or tied to a cross, to be dropped in a jagged hole, the sockets being pulled from the joints, the breathing and the heaving on the cross.

Many times people lasted for days on a Roman cross. The blood, the bleeding, the insects, the birds. Often they were hung there in nakedness to amplify their shame. When Jesus died and hung there on that cross, bleeding and dying for you and for me, you say, "To what end? Who did this?" Isaiah tells us that it was the will of God to crush Him. God loved you so much and wanted to settle this issue with you and me so much of our sin that He hung His darling Son. God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. God Himself took our sin, and He took our shame upon the cross.

He absorbed the judicial wrath of God. He is smitten by God and afflicted. The Lord laid on Him our iniquities. He did that for you and for me, and Isaiah saw it. The sin-bearer. It was a mockery of justice, of course, the trials of Jesus. There were approximately six episodes in the trial of Jesus, every one of them a mockery of justice. He was accused and falsely accused, and Isaiah tells us, as the scripture later records, that Jesus, the Messiah, answered not a word. This is the silence of the Lamb, the Lamb of God who stood there silent.

When you read these accounts, don't you want to just say, "Jesus, do something! Stop this! Don't let them do this!" But He answered them not a word, because had He answered and justified Himself and saved Himself, He could not have saved you and me.

There's a lot of talk that goes on today about Jesus and who He is and who He's not, but there's coming a day when every mouth is going to be stopped. That's at the judgment. There'll be no more talking there, no more party time there. Every mouth will be shut in judgment unless you accept what Jesus has done for you. He shut His mouth in judgment and stood there and took it for us, so that rather than standing in silence in judgment one day, we can stand with hallelujahs and praises to His name, thanking Him forever for what He's done for us.

By His stripes we are healed. The disease of sin is now cured. God is satisfied with this sacrifice, what God has done for us. He has accounted unto us righteousness. We stand in the righteousness of Christ. He stood in our sin so that we can now stand in His salvation and righteousness. We are justified, which means that our standing before a holy God is accounted as to righteousness before Him. This is the gospel of Isaiah, that when man did his worst, God did his best.

He loves you, and He has settled the issue of sin so that you can be forever transformed. Finally, thank God there's the exaltation of Christ. Isaiah saw this resurrection and exaltation. Look at verses 8 and 10: "By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people?"

They said He's finished, He's done, that's over with. Even his disciples ran away in fear and terror, and they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death. Of course, that was fulfilled in Joseph of Arimathea, the rich man who offered his empty tomb to the one who had died.

The rich man in his death, and although He had done no violence and there was no deceit in his mouth, yet it was the will of the Lord to crush Him. He has put Him to grief. When His soul makes an offering for guilt, He shall see His offspring, referencing you and me. We are the family of God. We are the children of God. He shall prolong his days. That references the resurrection. The will of the Lord shall prosper in His hand.

Jesus is now exalted, raised from the dead. This is the glorious news of the Bible. He is alive! The one that Isaiah now sees is the same one that he saw in amazement in Isaiah 6 when he saw the Lord high and lifted up and His train filled the temple, and they cried out continually, "Holy, holy, holy." That's what they're saying in heaven this very minute in His presence.

He is our redeemer because only He saves. He is our healer because only God heals. He is our sustainer. We pray in His name and we are strengthened. We call upon His name. He ever lives to make intercession for His saints. He intercedes for the transgressors. He is the link between a holy God and sinful man. He is our victor, even in death. We are not afraid because He holds the keys to the grave and to death and to hell.

The only response to the gospel of Isaiah is to respond by faith and receive it and then to believe it and then to worship Him for the rest of our days, to contemplate and live the gospel, to live a cross-centered life. Our character is changed. We are no longer bound and broken by our sin, but we are alive in Him to spend our days honoring Him and our future forever praising Him. This is the gospel of Isaiah, which is the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ by receiving the eternal gift of salvation right now.

Guest (Female): You're listening to PowerPoint with Jack Graham and the message "The Gospel of Isaiah". I want you to know that right now your support goes even further to help share the hope of Jesus with people around the world. Thanks to a generous $150,000 matching grant, every gift this month will be doubled to help proclaim God's word through PowerPoint Ministries. That means you'll help reach even more people who desperately need truth, encouragement, and the gospel.

As a heartfelt thank you for your generous gift this month, we'll send you Dr. Graham's book, "Help", to remind you that you are not alone, your pain is not unseen, and God's peace is real. Text MAR to 59789 to have your gift doubled and request your copy today. Again, text MAR to 59789.

Be sure to sign up to receive Dr. Graham's daily video devotional on the "Seven Words from the Cross". This powerful study will remind you of the sacrifice Jesus made so that we can be forgiven of our sins and reconciled to God. Dr. Graham will share a short devotional about the final words that Jesus spoke from the cross and what they mean to us today. To sign up, just text CROSS to 59789. It's absolutely free to join, so text CROSS to 59789. Pastor, what is your PowerPoint for today?

Jack Graham: What we see in this well-known chapter of Isaiah is a Messianic prophecy. This should be of invaluable importance to us as believers because it points specifically as to whom Jesus is and what He came to do. Now, anyone who studies the Bible will tell you that one of the most conclusive evidences of the Christian faith is fulfilled prophecy, which is history pre-written.

In Isaiah 53, it is as though Isaiah himself is standing in the presence of Jesus, standing at the foot of the cross. Even though he was writing this 750 years before Christ, he gives us a vivid and enthralling picture of the Lord Jesus, who would take our sins upon Himself. Isaiah describes the incarnation, which means God in the flesh or God becoming man. But of course, the primary theme and thrust of this passage is the crucifixion of Christ.

Verses 4 through 6 of Isaiah 53 present some of the most recognizable and penetrating words about Jesus in the whole of scripture. Just listen to these words once again: "Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; and upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him all our iniquities."

With these extraordinary words, we have the gospel according to Isaiah, the proclamation of who Jesus is and what He came to do. You see, God loved you so much that He hung His darling Son on the cross. Jesus took all your sin, your bitterness, your anger, your pain, your judgment—all of it—in order to give you abundant and eternal life. If you haven't received Christ as your Savior, do it right now. Respond to the gospel of Isaiah, which is the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, by receiving the eternal gift of salvation right now.

Guest (Female): And that is today's PowerPoint. Join us again next time as Dr. Graham brings a message about how your life can overflow with world-changing love. That's next time on PowerPoint with Jack Graham. PowerPoint with Jack Graham is sponsored by PowerPoint Ministries.