We've been thinking all week about the series of poems in the second half of Isaiah that

we call the servant songs.

We know from the New Testament that both the Lord Jesus himself and the apostles saw them

as prophecies of Jesus' ministry, that give clues to his character and significance.

And today I want to reflect on the third of these songs, in Isaiah 50 verses 4 through 9.

I hope you'll read the section later on.

And if it's the first time you can remember reading Isaiah 50, 49, I hope you'll read

it again and again.

It's not only one of the most beautiful descriptions of the Lord Jesus in the Old Testament, it's

also one of the most instructive, and we've time to look at only a couple of points from

it today.

First of all, in this poem, the servant himself speaks and picks up what was said of him

earlier in the first servant song.

He is able to sustain with a word, him who is weary.

If you're an Anglican, you'll be familiar with the words of the prayer book Communion

Service when it introduces Jesus' words from Matthew 11 verse 28.

Here what comfortable words are, save your Christ's Seth unto all that truly turn to

him.

Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Well, these words in Isaiah are the explanation for Jesus' words in Matthew's gospel.

He is the one who gives rest to the weary.

But Isaiah 50 now goes on to explain why the Lord Jesus is able to do this.

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