4 JESUS THE WONDER

JESUS
THE WONDER

Our subject this morning is Jesus THE Wonder. You will find the text in Isa 9:6 : “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” The prophet Isaiah with a mind illumined by the Holy Spirit, looked down 740 years and saw the coming of Jesus of Nazareth and uttered the sublime words of our text. In them is wrapped up a world of meaning concerning the Divine glory, the matchless character, and wonderful offices of our Lord Jesus, but this morning we must limit our thought to one clause in the great verse, “His name shall be called wonderful.” To get the full significance of the name in this connection we must compare the verse with another deeply significant Bible verse, Jdg 13:18, “And the angel of Jehovah said unto him, wherefore askest thou after my name, seeing it is wonderful?” In the Authorized Version this reads, “And the Angel of the Lord said unto him, why askest thou thus after my name, seeing it is SECRET?” But in the Hebrew, the word translated “Secret” in the Authorized Version and “Wonderful” in the Revised Version, is the same word as the word translated “Wonderful” in our text only it has an adjective ending of one letter, the word translated “Wonderful” in our text being, as we shall see later, a noun and not an adjective. So the name given in our text to the coming Messiah here is the same as that announced by the “Angel of Jehovah” in Jdg 13:18 as being His own name. It could be shown, were there time, that the “Angel of Jehovah” was a Divine person, the second person of the Triune Jehovah, our Lord before His incarnation in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. The name “Wonderful” then in our text was another Divine name besides the two Divine names that follow “Mighty God,” and “Everlasting Father.” It has been suggested by many that this verse should be translated, “And his name shall be called “Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace,” making “Wonderful” an adjective qualifying “Counsellor.” But “wonderful” in the Hebrew is not an adjective but a noun, so that translation is a grammatical impossibility. The translation of this verse given by Leeser, the unchristian Jew, is interesting. It is. “For a child is born unto us, a Son hath been given unto us, and the government is placed upon His shoulders; and His name is called, Wonderful, counsellor of the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace.” The purpose of this change of translation is obvious. Leeser, as an unbelieving Jew, is aiming to get around the force of the Christian argument based upon this verse that the calling of the coming Messiah by the two Divine names, “Mighty God” and “Everlasting Father,” shows that by the plain teaching of their own Jewish Scriptures that the Messiah was to be a Divine person. Unfortunately for Leeser, and other Jewish translators of his type, there is absolutely nothing in the Hebrew text to warrant the insertion of either the word “of” or the word “the”; “of” inserted twice and “the” inserted three times. Furthermore, if there were anything in the text to warrant the insertion of “of,” it must be inserted before “Prince of Peace” as well as before “Mighty God” and “Everlasting Father,” and of course that would make nonsense, for the coming Messiah, by the unbelieving Jews’ own conception of Him, was not to be “counsellor of the Prince of Peace” but to be “Prince of Peace” Himself. This is only one of the many instances in which the wily Leeser corrupts the text of the Hebrew Bible which the Jews themselves admit to be correct, in order to read out of it what God has put into it. God through the prophet Isaiah said, “His name shall be called Wonder, Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace,” not, as Leeser reads and unconverted Jews generally would like to read, “Wonderful, counsellor of the mighty God, of the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.” The word translated “Wonderful” is a very significant word. As I said a few moments ago it is a noun, not an adjective and would be more accurately rendered “Wonder” or “Marvel.” So translated this part of the verse would read “His name shall be called Wonder, Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” The derivation of the noun is interesting and suggestive. It comes from a verb, the primary meaning of which is “to separate,” “to distinguish,” and then “to make distinguished, extraordinary, wonderful,” and “to be wonderful,” “to be marvelous.” The plural participle is used as a substantive in a large number of places in the Old Testament as descriptive of God’s wonderful works or marvelous deeds or miracles in creating and sustaining the world (Job 5:9; Job 37:14; Psa 72:18), and preserving and aiding and delivering His people in Egypt, (Exo 3:20; Exo 34:10; Jdg 6:13; Psa 106:22), and in the wilderness (Jos 3:5; Neh 9:9-17), and God’s wonderful works in general (Psa 9:2; Psa 26:7). The usage of the exact word found in our text is also interesting. It is used of the wonders God alone does in six places, Exo 15:11; Psa 77:11; Psa 77:14; Psa 78:12; Psa 88:10; Isa 25:1. On the whole it seems that the most adequate translation of the words used here would be “His name shall be called “Wonder” (the Wonder of wonders, the most wonderful of all God’s wondrous doings), or “His name shall be called “Marvel” (the Marvel of marvels, the most marvelous of all God’s marvelous doings), or “His name shall be called “Miracle” (the Miracle of miracles, the most miraculous of all God’s miraculous doings). In the Bible names have a meaning, especially the names given to God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. The name is a revelation of what one is. Jesus is called “Wonder” because He is the Wonder, the Wonder of wonders, the most wonderful of all God’s wondrous doings. Jesus is the “Wonder” of Wonders, the “Marvel” of marvels, the most marvelous of all God’s marvelous doings, the “Miracle” of miracles, the most miraculous of all God’s miraculous doings.

I—JESUS IS THE WONDER, THE MARVEL, THE MIRACLE IN HIS NATURE.

First of all, Jesus is the “Wonder,” the Wonder of wonders, in His nature.

1. In the first place, He is a Divine Being. He is Divine in a sense in which no other man is Divine. The Bible (the Old Testament as well as the New Testament) is full of this great truth. Our Lord Jesus Himself most unhesitatingly made this claim. In Mark 12:6, after speaking of the Old Testament prophets even the greatest, as servants, He speaks of Himself as the “beloved Son” of God and the “one” (i.e., the only) Son of God. In John 10:30 He says, “I and my Father are one.” In John 14:9 He goes so far as to say, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father,” and in John 5:23 He says, “All men should honor the Son even as they honor the Father.” The Apostle John said of Jesus in the opening verses of His Gospel, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him; and without Him was not anything made that hath been made.” (John 1:1-3). And further down in the chapter, in the 14th verse he says, “And the Word (that is, this Word that was in the beginning and that was with God and was God) became flesh and dwelt among us (and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth.” The Apostle Thomas after the resurrection of our Lord, fell at the feet of Jesus and cried to Him, “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28). The Apostle Paul said of Him that “In Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Col 2:9), and he says of Him again in Rom 9:5, “Who is over all, God blessed forever.” The Apostle Peter says of Him in Acts 10:36 “He is Lord of all.” The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews said of Him, “He is the effulgence of His (i.e., God’s) glory, and the very image of His (that is, God’s) substance,” and that He “upholds all things by the Word of His power” (Heb 1:3) Paul in Php 2:6 says that before He became man He “existed originally in the form of God.” If the Bible makes anything as plain as day, it makes it as plain as day that our Lord Jesus is a Divine Being with all the attributes, glory, majesty, authority and rights that belong to God and to God alone. By the use of numerous Divine names, by the ascription of all the distinctively Divine attributes, by the predication of several unmistakably Divine offices, by referring statements which in the Old Testament distinctly name Jehovah God as their subject to Jesus Christ in the New Testament, by coupling the name of Jesus Christ with that of God the Father in a way in which it would be impossible to couple that of any finite being with that of the Deity, and by the clear teaching that Jesus Christ should be worshipped, even as God the Father is worshipped—in all these unmistakable ways, God in His own Word distinctly proclaims that Jesus Christ is a Divine Being, is God. Well then might the prophet Isaiah as in this inspired vision he looked down the future centuries and saw the coming Messiah, Jesus, cry “His name shall be called Wonder!”

If Jesus was not “very God of very God,” then John was mistaken, and Paul was mistaken, and Jesus Himself was mistaken, and only that denomination that has never been noted for its prayerfulness, its spirituality, its clearness of spiritual vision, its devotion, its self-sacrifice, its missionary enterprise, that denomination which has only a history of building churches to see them die, that denomination alone is right! And John and Peter and Paul and Jesus Himself are wrong, and Jesus Himself was not even a good man but a rank and blasphemous impostor. Do you believe that? Can you believe that? No, a thousand times, no. No man who is thoroughly sane in his head and thoroughly sound in his heart can believe that. Then Jesus is a Divine Being, God manifest in the flesh. He is wonderful, most wonderful, beyond description, wonderful beyond conception. He is infinitely wonderful. He is Jesus, the “Wonder,” the Wonder of Wonders; Jesus the “marvelous,” the Marvel of Marvels; Jesus the “Miracle,” the Miracle of Miracles. The wonderfulness of His being and nature will be the object of our glad and adoring contemplation and the theme of our highest praises throughout the endless aeons that are to come. “A great multitude which no man can number, out of every nation, and of all tribes and peoples and tongues,” shall stand “before the throne (of God) and before the Lamb, arrayed in white robes and palms in their hands:” and they shall “cry with a great voice, saying, Salvation unto our God who sitteth on the throne, and unto the Lamb. And all the angels . . . standing round about the throne, and about the elders and the four living creatures,” and shall fall “before the throne on their faces,” and shall worship “God, saying, Amen: Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honour, and power, and might, he unto our God forever and ever. Amen.” (Rev 7:9-11)

2. But there is another wonderful thing about the nature of Jesus, While He is Divine He is at the same time a real man. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” but “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” (John 1:1; John 1:14). Jesus of Nazareth was indeed “the only begotten Son of God” but He was at the same time, the “Son of man.” He is, as Paul tells us in 1Ti 2:5 the “mediator between God and men, Himself man, Christ Jesus.” Do you ask how are the perfect Deity and the perfect humanity united in Jesus? I do not know. Neither do I know how spirit and body are united in myself but I know that they are. I do not know how the Divine nature I received in the New Birth is united with the physical and intellectual and moral nature that I received by my natural birth, but I know that it is. And so also I know that Jesus is perfectly Divine and perfectly human. I know that a perfect Divine nature and a real human nature coexist in the one person, Jesus of Nazareth. This perfect union of complete Deity and complete humanity in Jesus is one of the most wonderful things about Him, one of the most incomprehensible things about Him, one of the things that makes Him the “Wonder,” the Wonder of Wonders, the “Marvel,” the Marvel of Marvels. But as incomprehensible as it is, it is a fact, and it is a fact that makes it necessary to call Him “Wonder” or “Marvel” or “Miracle.” Well then might the prophet say, or rather God say through the prophet, “His name shall be called Wonder.”

II—JESUS IS THE WONDER THE MARVEL, THE MIRACLE IN HIS CHARACTER. In the second place, Jesus is the “Wonder,” the “Marvel,” the “Miracle,” in His character. While Jesus is wonderful in His nature, in His Divine glory and perfect humanity and in the union of the two, He is not wonderful in His nature alone, He is wonderful in His character. His character was absolutely perfect. He was absolutely without blemish and without spot. He was not only faultless, but every possible perfection of character was incarnated in Him. There is not a perfection of character of which we can think that is not to be found in Him and found in Him in its fulness. As the years go by and we study Him more and more carefully and come to see Him as He was and is more and more fully, the more the absolute and infinite perfection of His character stands forth. For thirty-four years He lived in a hostile world that sought to find some imperfection in Him but they could find none. For eighteen centuries since infidels have been hunting for some flaw in the character of Jesus and they cannot find it. What would not the infidels give if they could only put their finger upon one single flaw, even one little defect in that character, but they cannot. Even the bitterest and boldest and most unscrupulous infidel of his day was forced to say, “I wish to say once for all that to that great and serene man, I pay, I gladly pay, the homage of my admiration and of my tears.” Jesus in the perfection of His character is indeed wonderful. He is the “Wonder,” the Wonder of wonders. He is the Wonder of the ages. He stands out absolutely peerless and alone. When any man ventures to put anyone else alongside of Jesus Christ he at once loses the confidence and the respect of all candid and fair-minded men.

1. In the first place, Jesus was perfect in Holiness. Peter spoke of Him as “The Holy One and the Just” (Acts 3:14). John spoke of Him as “the Holy One” (1Jn 2:20). Even the unclean spirits when they met Him were forced to cry out to Him, “I know thee, who thou art, the Holy One of God” (Mark 1:24). The Epistle to the Hebrews speaks about Him as “holy, guileless, undefiled, separated from sinners.” He passed through all our experiences of conflict and temptation, yet “without sin.” (Heb 4:15). The dazzling white light that glorified the face and garments of Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration was the outshining of the moral purity within.

2. In the second place, He was perfect in Love. He was not only perfect in His holiness, but He was also perfect in His love. His love to God was perfect and so was His love to man. His love to God revealed itself in His unhesitating obedience to every command of God and in His unreserved surrender to God’s will, whatever that will might be; in His drawing back from no sacrifice that God demanded, and rejoicing to do His will even when that will meant His own shame and agony and death; in His delight in doing God’s will, a delight so great that forgetting the long-denied demands of bodily hunger, He could triumphantly say, “My meat is to do the will of Him who sent me and to accomplish His work” (John 4:34 R.V.). His love to God was absolutely perfect but so was His love to man. His love to man took in all men; it took in the good, but it took in also the vilest. It took in men like John, the beloved disciple, and Nathanael, “an Israelite indeed in whom was no guile”; but it took in also the demoniac of Gadara, the thief on the cross, the woman possessed of seven demons, and the woman “who was a sinner,” an outcast of the streets. It took in even His most relentless enemies for whom He prayed even as He endured the agonies and the reproaches and the shame they heaped upon Him, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” (Luk 23:34). His love hesitated at no sacrifice: “Though He was rich, yet for our sakes He became poor, that we through His poverty might become rich” (2Co 8:9, R.V.), “Being in the form of God, He counted not the being on an equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men; and being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, yea, even the death of the cross.” (Php 2:6-8). Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful love! that, seeing full equality in honor and glory with God Himself within His grasp, turned His back upon all this and chose the cow stable for His birthplace, the poor carpenter shop for His school, the contempt and rejection of men for His reward, the agony of Gethsemane, and the shame and ignominy and torture of death upon the cross of Calvary for its consummation, because by these things He could save the vile and worthless and outcast. Well might Isaiah say that Jesus’ name should be called “Wonder,” Wonder of all wonders.

Much more could be said of the wonders of His character. We have recently considered in our studies of “The Real Christ,” the perfection of His Compassion, the perfection of His Meekness, the perfection of His Gentleness, the perfection of His Humility, the perfection of His Manliness, of His Imperturbable Peace, His Constant Joyfulness and His Unconquerable Optimism. We cannot recount, or even summarize, now the things which we have seen, but as we look even as hastily as we have today at the manifold perfection of His character, we must cry with the prophet of 2600 years ago “His name shall be called ‘Wonder!’ ”

III—JESUS IS THE WONDER, THE MARVEL, THE MIRACLE IN HIS WORK.

Jesus is also the “Wonder,” the “Marvel,” the “Miracle” in His work. As wonderful as Jesus is in His nature and in His character, He is not wonderful in His nature and character alone, He is also wonderful in His work.

1. In the first place, He made a perfect atonement for sin. “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath made to strike on Him the iniquity of us all.” (Isa 53:6). Every sin of ours was settled by the death of Jesus upon the cross, “Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth upon a tree.” (Gal 3:13). The death of Christ so perfectly atoned for sin that the moment I believe on Jesus Christ and thus accept the atonement He has made for me, every sin of mine is blotted out from God’s account and God reckons me as perfectly righteous in Him. “Him who knew no sin He made to be sin in our behalf; that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2Co 5:21, R.V.). Is not this wonderful? Is it not amazing that the vilest sinner in Los Angeles, or anywhere else on this earth, the liar, the thief, the blasphemer, the murderer, the harlot, may come into this place this morning all crimson with the sins they have committed and yet the death of Christ has so perfectly atoned for them all that the moment they accept that atonement all their sins are blotted out and they become as white as snow? Oh, when the sins I have committed come up before me and they have been very great (indeed, the sins of everyone here today have been very great, though we may not realize it), but when they come up, as many and great and black as they are, I look away at the cross and I see Jesus hanging there and I hear that cry that burst from his lips as the weight of my guilt crushes Him, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me,” and I hear His other cry, “It is finished,” and I can see the Roman soldier draw back his spear, and I can see it go crashing into that side, I see the life blood pouring out and I know that all my sins are atoned for, my every sin atoned for. I know that “Jesus paid my debt, All the debt I owe, Sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow.”

Oh, it is wonderful! the sin of the whole race atoned for at Calvary, and all that any man has to do to enjoy the fruits of that atonement is just to accept Him that made it.

2. In the second place, Jesus not only made an atonement for sin, He also saves from sin’s power. He not only died and thus made perfect atonement for sin, but He also rose again and is a living Saviour and has “all power in heaven and on earth” (Mat 28:18) and therefore, “He is able to save to the uttermost (all) them that come unto God through Him, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them.” (Heb 7:25). Jesus Christ has power to do what no one else can do, to set any man who will put his trust in Him free from any sin and from the power of all sin. He Himself said “If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed” (John 8:36), and eighteen centuries of history have proved it true. Is it not wonderful that there is not a man on earth so completely in sin’s power but that Jesus Christ can set him free? Is He not the “Wonder,” the Wonder of wonders? As I speak what an army of men and women that I have known to be saved from sin’s power come before me. One night many years ago, I met a man who had been a wanderer on the face of the earth for many years. He had come of a good family, had been well educated, had moved in good society, but had turned his back on all this and had given himself up to a life of sin and now at the age of perhaps 45 he was completely in sin’s power. He was a large, powerful man, but he approached me with much hesitation, drew me to one side and leaning over, whispered in my ear this question, “Do you think Jesus Christ can save me?” I replied, “I know He can.” Then I sat down beside Him and reasoned with him out of the Scriptures and he listened, believed and was saved that night. For years he was a happy Christian and enslaving sins were things of the past. Tonight he is with Christ in the glory. That is but one case out of thousands and tens of thousands. I have known many, many such personally. I have seen Jesus Christ set men free from sin in pretty much every state in the Union. I have seen Him do it in England, Scotland, Ireland, Germany, France, Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania, China, Japan and India. I have seen Him set men free from pretty much every known form of sin. There is a sin that a wise man of wide experience, who is in this audience, once told me that experience proved there was no deliverance from, but I have known a man delivered from that very sin by the power of Jesus Christ. There are right in this audience this morning many men and women whom Jesus hath set free from an awful slavery that once held them utterly captive. Indeed, Jesus completely transforms men. The man who once was a blasphemer now prays. The man who once loved the vile book now loves the Bible. The man who once loved to look at vile pictures now loves to look into the face of Jesus. The man who once told questionable stories now sings hymns of praise. The men and women who once gave themselves over to sin and vice are now working with all their might for the salvation of their fellow-men. “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation; the old things are passed away; behold, they are become new.” (2Co 5:17.) Oh, the work of Jesus is wonderful, indeed, transforming demons into angels. One Sunday night I heard a man, who, a few years before, had been a ruffian, a drunken, profane, cruel brute, speaking to the best people of one of our eastern cities with great tenderness and pleading that they, too, would accept the same Jesus who had so wonderfully transformed his life and that of his wife. Jesus is, indeed, wonderful in His work, the “Wonder,” the Wonder of wonders.

3. But Jesus will do even more wonderful things in the future, when He comes again. He will raise the dead with His voice and He shall change also the living. As God puts it through the Apostle Paul, “Our citizenship is in heaven; from whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: (21) who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of His glory, according to the working whereby He is able even to subject all things unto Himself” (Php 3:20-21), and He will catch us up together with those who have been raised to meet Him in the air (1Th 4:16-17). He will transform us into His own perfect likeness physically, mentally, morally and spiritually. This old weak, sickly, pain-racked body will be changed into the likeness of His own glorious body, free from every ache and pain, free from every weakness, free from every limitation, resplendent with a beauty never seen on earth, capable of unlimited activity. And He will transform us morally also so that in our inmost character we shall be made just like Him (1Jn 3:2). He will bring us fully into our glorious inheritance as heirs of God and joint-heirs with Himself, heirs of all God is and all God has, heirs of His wisdom, His power, His holiness. Oh, it is wonderful! Jesus is indeed the “Wonder,” the Wonder of wonders, the “Marvel,” the Marvel of marvels, the “Miracle,” the Miracle of miracles. Jesus is the “Wonder” in the infinite glory of His Divine nature. Jesus is the “Wonder” in the manifold, matchless, marvelous and infinite perfection of His moral character. Jesus is the “Wonder” in His work, making perfect atonement for all our sins by His death, delivering us from all the power of sin by His resurrection life and His all prevailing intercession, transforming us from all imperfection of spirit, soul and body, into the full glory,—physical, mental and spiritual glory—of absolutely perfect sons of God, by His coming again. Jesus is the “Wonder,” the Wonder of wonders, the most wonderful of all the wondrous doings of the Infinite God. Jesus is the “Marvel,” the Marvel of marvels, the most marvelous of all the marvelous doings of the infinite God. Jesus is the “Miracle,” the Miracle of miracles, the most miraculous of all the miraculous doings of the infinite God. The creation of the heavens and the earth, the creation of the angels and principalities and powers in the heavenlies, are nothing to the eternal begetting of God’s only begotten and eternally existent Son and His incarnation in Jesus of Nazareth.

Now what will you do with Jesus the “Wonder”? Your answer to that question will determine your character, determine your life and determine your eternity. Will you accept Him as your Saviour or will you reject Him? Will you surrender gladly and whole-heartedly to His absolute Lordship, or will you say, “I will not have this man to rule over me”? Will you confess Him as your Lord openly before men and constantly, as often as you have opportunity, or will you deny Him by positive denial or by negative silence? Will you serve Him day and night with all the strength God will give you or will you live for self and the paltry ambitions and pleasures of the world? Will you work with all the powers that lie in you to bring others, at home and abroad, to know Jesus the “Wonder,” the Wonder of wonders, the “Marvel,” the Marvel of marvels, or will you let others go on in the barrenness that comes now through ignorance of Him and the eternal death that comes hereafter through ignorance of Him? Oh, the wisdom and the blessedness and the glory of those who accept Jesus the “Wonder” as their Saviour; surrender gladly and whole-heartedly to the absolute Lordship of Jesus the “Wonder”; confess unfalteringly and unwearyingly before men Jesus the “Wonder”; serve day and night with every God-given power Jesus the “Wonder”; work with all their power of spirit and soul and body to bring others to know Jesus the “Wonder”! Lord Jesus, the Wonder, the Wonder of wonders, we praise Thee, we adore Thee, we worship Thee!