Midweek Lent 2 – Pr. Anderson sermon
Isaiah 53:4, ELH #331 v. 3-4 “O Wondrous Love, what Hast Thou Done!”
March 4, 2026 | Christ Lutheran Church
In Nomine Iesu
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God of grace and mercy. We come before you in this season of penitence with hearts asking for cleansing. Hearts that are weighed down by the weight of our sins and iniquities. As we bow before the cross, may we not only see the horror of our sins, but may we take heart as we stare at your gracious and wondrous love. A love that we do not deserve. Help us and pick us up, that we may see our weight on your shoulders, and with love and joy, reveal this gracious love of the season with those who need to hear this same message. The message of the Gospel and the forgiveness of our sins. In the name of the One who by His wounds, we are indeed healed. Amen.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. (Rom. 1:7, etc.)
If you have a desire to be physically in shape, how is that journey going to begin? You might start by taking walks in the mornings, getting your legs stretched out and your cardio going. You might pick up running later. Once you are warmed up, then the weights might be added to the regiment. You start small, maybe a five-pound weight in each hand. You gradually build up to where you finally make the threshold of one-hundred-pounds. To lift this weight, you know you are going to have to push your own boundaries, searching within yourself for that last rep. Addressing spiritual weightlifting is almost the same thing. There are days you are fighting and searching within yourself to complete that last rep to just survive. Make this like a competition at a weightlifting meet, and you still see similarities. Except unlike the crowds cheering positively there, the crowd cheering as you spiritually weightlift is cheering against you. The crowd is made up of the world, the devil, and your very nature. In the moment where your arms are about to give up, God asks you a question. Why are you even attempting to lift that weight on your own? There is only one response to all the weight you carry. You look at the lamb and cry, O wondrous love, what hast Thou done!
To cry this out, there must be a realization that something is wrong. Sometimes that is visible. As our text for this evening is translated weakness, and we know what weakness looks like, the word weakness could also be translated sickness and that certainly is something we can see. This season has been notably bad for illness. As our text describes the Servant who could take care of such things, the people didn’t know how close they were to the Servant from Isaiah. That evening they brought to him many who were oppressed by demons, and he cast out the Spirit’s with a word and healed all who were sick. This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah: “He took our illnesses and bore our diseases” (Matthew 8:16-17). When we feel the weight of illness, we can feel when that weight is finally lifted. And as we go to the Lord with what we can see and ask for Him to take away those illnesses, it’s the spiritual illness that can be hung onto as it was with this same group of people. The people knew what it meant for this servant to be smitten and stricken by God. Could this Servant be a bad guy deserving of this punishment? The first part of our text is overlooked, as they failed to realize that His suffering was not for His sins but for the sins of the people.
There are many times where we can overlook this, even when it is not intentional. We know the job of this Servant, this lamb, that He does take away our sins. When we get caught up in our temptations, it can be very difficult to actually give up this great weight. There are times we can think that it would be better if we just shouldered it ourselves. When we do not esteem Him, we are wrong, and we are like the people who were going to reject the Servant’s gracious work. Truly, this is what we deserve, to bear up our own sins. We find this in the law like this example. “If anyone sins in that he hears a public adjuration to testify, and though he is a witness, whether he has seen or come to know the matter, yet does not speak, he shall bear his iniquity” (Leviticus 5:1). This is the proper order; the weight of our mistakes is going to crush us as it should.
Our enemies want us to think we must deal with the weight on our own. God tells us this is not true. His great servant David knew what it was like to be crushed by the great weight of his sin. But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people. All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads; “He trusts in the LORD; let him deliver him; let him rescue him, for he delights in him!” (Psalm 22:6-8) We are jeered at because of what we believe by the world around us, and by the devil himself. In despair he wants us to think we are worms. When we dwell underneath the crushing weight, we can say, “poor me.” Instead, we must dwell on the One who actually was punished. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.
Even in our selfishness, our heavenly Father uses this for His plan of Salvation as we see in stanza three, “Yea, Father, yea, most willingly I’ll bear what Thou commandest; My will conforms to Thy decree, I do what Thou demandest.” O wondrous Love, what hast Thou done! The Father offers up His Son; The Son, content, descendeth! O Love, how strong Thou art to save! Thou layest Him within the grave Whose might the boulders rendeth. The weight of the law and the weight of sin have only one place it can truly land for it to be carried, for it to be borne away. And with this great weight, there is the Lamb hearing the very Words of David. So also the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he desires him. For he said, ‘I am the Son of God” (Matthew 27:41-43) Stricken by the people, smitten by God, deeply and gravely afflicted, and contently bearing what thou commandest and demandest.
O wondrous love, what hast thou done is your only response! You have felt the weight of trials, tribulations, and sins, and in your lowest moments where it feels as though there is nowhere to find relief, the Lamb says, “give them to me. I bear them and so much more.” As Paul Gerhardt delt with the impact of the Thirty Years War, the only comfort he could give his people, the only comfort he himself could find, begins with this first verse, Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. As you see what you have done and what the law demands, the wondrous love of the Savior is that you can now say, Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases (Psalm 103:2-3). The crushing weight of your iniquities and diseases that should crush you forever are cured forever. For, He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed (1 Peter 2:24).
For your iniquities to be paid for, as St. Peter points out and in the fourth stanza of the hymn, it wasn’t pretty. Upon the cross Thou off’rest Him, Nails, spear, deep wounds bestowing; Thou slaught’rest Him e’en as a lamb, His soul and veins are flowing; From veins it is the crimson flood Of His most holy, precious blood, From soul His mighty sighing. O dearest Lamb, what shall I do To show Thee my devotion true For such great good supplying? Your devotion is to esteem Him, not as a worthless servant who is too good for you, but to esteem Him as your Lord, your God, your gracious Lamb who with love shed His blood on the cross for the forgiveness of all your sins.
There will be days where this sounds like too much, and there will be days where this body physically or spiritually can’t handle anymore. St. Paul writes about where any strength you have comes from, even if you think it is small. For the wondrous love of cross doesn’t just end at the cross. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you (Romans 8:1). The Lamb did the unthinkable. And He was content with the pain and anguish so you would not have to experience it forever. So is it with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable; what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body (1 Corinthians 15:42-44). O wondrous love, what hast Thou done! Your weakness is raised in power, forever and ever. Amen.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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