The Ambiguous Branch
/A Twlight Musing
Two Messianic passages in Isaiah speak of the Savior as a shoot from an apparently dead source, but they are starkly different in tone. In Isaiah 11 we have a mighty King:
There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. . . . [W]ith righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
(Is. 11: 1, 4)
Here the emphasis is on the Messiah as triumphal ruler, exercising divine power to bring justice and peace on the earth. In contrast, the other passage, Isaiah 53, presents a despised and rejected Messiah who is put to death unjustly: He
grew up . . . 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” (Is. 53: 2-3)
His role here is seen, not as ruler, but as one “wounded for our transgressions” (v. 5) and “oppressed” (v. 7).
I find it both startling and instructive that that there should be such contrasting uses of the same image of the Messiah as an unexpected offshoot or sprout. Both applications of the image are, of course, true, but they depict different stages of the Messiah’s impact on the world, and they need to be seen in the proper sequence. The presentation in Isaiah 11 focuses on the Davidic lineage of Jesus and on the ultimate rule of Christ on the New Earth when he reigns as David’s heir, exercising power over the “Peaceable Kingdom” depicted in Isaiah 11 and 65:17-25. However, this manifestation of the Messiah was not to come merely as a renewal of the flawed political Kingdom of Israel, nor was it to be a direct outcome of the First Advent of the Christ, but as a component of His Second Coming. Before the full fruition of Jesus as the Son of David must come the fulfillment of His mission as the Son of God, accomplished through His death as the perfect sacrificial Lamb of God. Only in that way could the temporal throne of David be transmuted into the Eternal Kingdom.
Moreover, that is also the pattern for us as God’s children. If we are to be glorified with Him, we must first participate in His suffering (see Rom. 8:17). Reflecting that truth, and in the spirit of the Advent season, I present the following poem.
The Budding Stump
(Isaiah 11:1-3 and 53:1-3)
The Stump of David,
Cracked and grey with age,
Neglected, cast aside,
Now sprouts again, as God had said.
Not couched in beauty, or in power,
Comes this obscure and unexpected Branch;
Nor with glory sought by swords,
Drenching Israel's enemies in blood--
Though bloodshed nascent lies within.
O Lord of stumps,
Whose sapience informs
What men have cast aside,
And makes to grow again
What You Yourself have pruned away:
Take now the hopes of glory
Grown and nourished by our pride;
Reform them by Your promised Shoot,
That we may find the power
That lies in roots, and not in mighty trees.
Elton D. Higgs (Dec. 26, 1982)
Image: "Winter Bloom" by MelissaTG. CC License.
