Jesus, our Guilt Offering

"Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, And the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand." Isaiah 53:10

The Hebrew word used here for "offering for sin" is literally the "guilt or trespass offering". To fully a appreciate this part of Isaiah 53, we need to see the Hebrew Bible as a foreshadowing of New Testament truths. In fact, the New Testament in many places was written as a fulfilment and explanation of the mysteries of the Old Testament. The New Testament is the Old Testament revealed.

The lamb without blemish took the place of the offerer in judgement

And so, we turn to Leviticus, where the Guilt Offering is expounded on.

"and he shall bring his trespass offering to the Lord for his sin which he has committed, a female from the flock, a lamb or a kid of the goats as a sin offering. So the priest shall make atonement for him concerning his sin." Leviticus 5:6

Note: (There is a really edifying sermon by Pastor Joseph Prince that would be a great resource to learn more about the Trespass Offering.) Needless to say, there is much more to learn from this offering and we are hoping to be able to do a series on this soon!

In Ancient Israel, whenever a person sins and realizes his guilt, the Trespass offering, or Guilt Offering, is the required sacrifice to atone for their misdoings. In other words, the Guilt Offering is what relieved the Sinner of his guilt. This does not negate the fact that he sinned, but this is the payment that he has to fulfil according to the mysterious wisdom of God.

For today, we shall focus on the beauty of Isaiah 53:10. Isaiah 53 is widely known to be a Messianic prophecy. And the word "an offering for sin" is actually the same word used in Leviticus 5:6 for "trespass offering" (to see how we found this beautiful secret, read this article on a free bible study tool we used). And Isaiah was really prophesying when he said to make "his soul an offering for sin". You will see that "his soul" really refers to the Messiah's, Jesus who is the perfect and final sacrifice (Hebrews 7:27). So what does this tell us about the verse? The message for us is something that is very applicable and inspiring for present-day believers. Now in our present day, we no longer offer sacrifices, because the final sacrifice was offered on the cross! We see the the work of Jesus encompassing even the Levitical laws of sacrifice. Isaiah 53:10 tells us that Jesus is our Trespass Offering, He is our Guilt Offering. And because of this, our guilty conscience can be wiped clean! And God sees us in the body of Christ, His righteous judgement spent on that body of the sacrifice.

And what of the second half of the verse? God shall see His Seed, and prolong His days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hands. In the practice of sacrifice, the offering is seen as a representative of the offer-er. And today, as we think about Jesus our ultimate offering, God sees our representative instead of us. Thus, when He looks at you, believer, He sees His very own Seed, He will prolong His days, and His seed shall bring Him Joy. The absolute perfect work of Christ, has brought us not just to our original positions, but a higher place in Christ. Because now Christ has become our representative, God sees us through the figure of Christ. He delights in us, through the figure of Christ!

Let this Truth sink into your hearts today!