If you read the Bible, you'll see how quickly things can go from good, to bad to worse for people. Some of it has to do with standing up against an unrighteous generation and remaining faithful, but much of it has to do with people doing whatever is right by their own definition, or, as the Bible phrases it "Everyone did what was right in their own eyes." This is nothing new. It's been done since Adam and Eve disobeyed the Lord. We chose for ourselves what is right, and we choose to stand by our choices. Unfortunately, most of our choices are built by the wounds we acquire, either self-inflicted by our rebellion against God, or by those who are in rebellion against God. And it's these wounds that we allow to mark every choice we make; most of us are bleeding all over the place.
Is it any wonder that, in such a wounded and broken world, that our hearts are so calloused and scarred? The Word calls it a "hard heart," or a "heart of stone." The longer we live like the world, the more scarred and hardened our hearts become. What is the cure? What can heal these wounds, self-inflicted and otherwise? None other than the wounds that bring healing, Jesus Christ, the One who lived in perfect obedience to the Father, and gave Himself up as the once for all sacrifice that we may forever be renewed and restored. He can give us a new heart, and He can heal the wounds that fester and poison our souls. He makes us new, born again in to a New human, as He intended us to be from the beginning. Beloved, today you are faced with a choice, to be led by your wounds, or to be renewed and led by Jesus Christ. Which wounds will lead you? Isaiah 53:1-12 Who has believed what he has heard from us?
And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?
For he grew up before him like a young plant,
and like a root out of dry ground;
he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,
and no beauty that we should desire him.
He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
and as one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth.
Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.
