"Singing of God's Rich Mercy"

"Behold My Servant shall deal prudently, He shall be exalted and extolled, and be very high. As many were astonished at thee; His visage was so marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men: so shall He sprinkle many nations; the kings shall shut their mouths at Him: for that which had not been told them shall they see; and that which they had not heard shall they consider." (Isaiah 52:13-15) Back in the days, before Jesus died on the cross, this passage of Scripture might not have made much sense; but that all changed on the very special day. There is something else which we must consider about that verse 54:1, and the aspect of not being able to bear; because, as Jesus Himself said in Matthew 7:13 & 14, "Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it". The reason that we must take this into consideration is because of our inability to get it right; which means that we are not able to get pure enough to please God; nor are we able to become Holy enough to enter into His presence. Yet, there are many who will pursue that road, and will, if I may, try to 'travail with child' in the pursuit of godliness. As we look at the Servant mentioned in Isaiah 52:13, we can realize now that He is Jesus Christ; and as the Scripture says, He "shall deal prudently". At the risk of seeming wise or prudent myself (which I am not), let me say that 'perfect love' plays perfectly into this passage of Scripture; and as I said yesterday, to understand the concept of having joy though a trial we must have a clue of the outcome. The word 'prudently' comes from the Hebrew word "sakhal' which for the purpose of this particular verse, it means knowing the reason for something; which is the thing that drove Jesus to the cross, because He knew what the outcome would be, and why He was here: that God's Rich Mercy could do for us what we could never do on our own...