“He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not” (Isaiah 53:3).

The marvelous hymn of the last century, “Hallelujah, What A Savior!,” provides in pithy but powerful form, an insight into the work of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, on the cross. For the next few days, let us use its familiar verses to “think on these things” (Philippians 4:8).

Man of Sorrows!“ What a name,
For the Son of God who came.
Ruined sinners to reclaim!
Hallelujah, what a Savor!

The creation should have brought great joy to the Creator, “for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created” (Revelation 4:11). But ever since the beginning, the “very good” creation has defied Him, bringing great grief. In the days of Noah, “it repented the LORD that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him at His heart” (Genesis 6:6).

But even in the face of such sinful defiance, the rejected Creator, the very Son of God came to “deliver them who . . . were all their lifetime subject to bondage. . . . To make reconciliation for the sins of the people” (Hebrews 2:15,17).

Yet when He came, instead of receiving a liberator’s welcome, He was again “despised and rejected,” as in our text for today. He was ridiculed and slandered, hounded and hunted; His body was beaten and broken and hung on a cross. But through it all “He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows. . . . Was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities, . . . was oppressed and afflicted” (vs.4–7), reclaiming ruined sinners.

Hallelujah, what a Savior! JDM