ao:eng_webu
Isaiah 53
1Who has our message? To whom has the LORD’s arm been revealed?
2For he grew up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no good looks or majesty. When we see him, there is no beauty that we should him.
3He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering and acquainted with disease. He was despised as one from whom men hide their face; and we didn’t respect him.
4Surely he has borne our sickness and carried our suffering; yet we considered him plagued, struck by God, and afflicted.
5But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought our peace was on him; and by his wounds we are healed.
6All we like sheep have gone astray. Everyone has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
7He was oppressed, yet when he was afflicted he didn’t open his mouth. As a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and as a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he didn’t open his mouth.
8He was taken away by oppression and judgment. As for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living and stricken for the disobedience of my people?
9They made his grave with the wicked, and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, nor was any in his mouth.
10Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him. He has caused him to suffer. When you make his soul an for sin, he will see his offspring. He will prolong his days and the LORD’s pleasure will prosper in his hand.
11After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light and be satisfied. My servant will many by the knowledge of himself; and he will bear their iniquities.
12Therefore I will give him a portion with the great. He will divide the plunder with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was counted with the transgressors; yet he bore the sins of many and made intercession for the transgressors.
Slow reading
Read Isaiah 53 three times
Guided passes through short verse groups: read it whole, watch the words, then pray it back. Phrases to stop on along the way, with deeper explanation held back until you have read the verses yourself.
Ask about this chapter
Have a question about Isaiah 53?
Ask anything about this chapter. Every answer names the verses it rests on and links straight to them, highlighted in the reader.
Study together
Questions on Isaiah 53
Every comment is tied to a place in the text: a verse, a span of verses, or one section of the study. Ask what you do not understand, and answer others from Scripture.
Sign in to ask a question or answer one. Reading always stays open to everyone.
Questions this passage answers
What is sin?
Scripture defines sin as lawlessness, as falling short of God's glory, and as failing to do the good we know we should do. It is not only a list of bad actions but a condition of the heart that produces them, and it is first against God rather than only against people. Scripture also says all have sinned, that its wage is death, and that God is faithful to forgive those who confess.
What is the Gospel?
The Gospel is news, not advice. It is the announcement that God became man in Jesus Christ, lived the life we owed, died the death we deserved, rose bodily from the dead, and now freely forgives and reconciles everyone who turns from sin and trusts him. It is something done, reported to us, before it is anything asked of us.
Why did Jesus have to die?
Jesus died because sin has a real penalty, death, and God chose to bear that penalty himself rather than simply overlook it. Scripture presents the cross as a substitution: the sinless one carrying the guilt of the guilty, so that God could remain just and still forgive. It was not an accident that overtook him. It was the plan he came to fulfil.