Let us turn back to the portion we have read. We have read in the prophecy of Isaiah, chapter 53, and we want to center our attention on words in chapter, in verse 11. He shall see of the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied. Two strands of thought there. Travail of soul that was endured by the Saviour as he worked out the redemption of his people. And secondly, the satisfaction of soul that accrues to him from the sufferings that were entailed in that transaction. And we will seek to look at these in that order. First, then, the travel of Saul as he sought to work out the redemption of his people. And we'll look at this under two headings. First, we'll call the gathering darkness as we look at the sufferings, the trauma that he experienced in the week or so before the cross of Calvary. And then secondly, we'll take the heading, the horror of darkness, taking our cue from the experience of Abraham in Genesis chapter 15, the horror of darkness, looking at particularly the three hours of darkness on the cross. The gathering darkness then was by anticipation, the anticipation of what lay ahead. the anticipation of what lay ahead in terms of the bearing of the wrath and curse of God due to his people as sinners, as he stood in the Roman place. No doubt that was given to him by the Spirit into his human understanding. The anticipation of what lay ahead was traumatic because, well, because he knew what was there. We don't know what lies ahead of us, and that, in the Lord's mercy, the Savior was shown exactly what he must pass through, and that intensified the nature of his trauma. He was also given progressively, step by step, an understanding of what lay ahead. You find, for example, in chapter 12 of the Gospel according to John, you find two Greeks coming up to Andrew and Philip and saying, we would say Jesus. And these two disciples brought the matter to Jesus himself. And Jesus' response was, yes, the Son of Man will be glorified. He saw in this request the gospel going beyond the confines of Israel and going out to Gentiledom and going out worldwide. He saw a harvest of souls ultimately being gathered in. And alongside that, he said, corn of wheat must fall into the ground and die, before there is such a harvest. Speaking of his own death, that he himself must pass through this death, temporal, spiritual, eternal, in the room of his people, before there could be such a harvest. And then we find a heaviness of soul coming upon him as he considers that. You find the words spoken, now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? And what shall I say? The one of whom it was said, never man speak like this man. but brought to an end of himself with what was set before him, this anticipation of what lay before him. Step by step, the Lord was opening up to him what was there. And undoubtedly, to intensify all that, the Lord was setting it before him by way of trials. trial of his faith, he must live by faith, but there would also be a malicious one who would be insinuating his own malicious intonations into all of that, that he was not at all the son of God and so on, and that would intensify things. step by step, a progressive opening up to him by his spirit of what lay ahead. When you come to Gethsemane, there is a quantitative leap in his realization of what is entailed, what he must pass through. It's as if there was a graph, gentle graph, a slope, understanding, his understanding being opened up into what lay ahead. But when you come to Gethsemane, it goes off the scale. It is a quantitative leap in it. He saw more fully. And there was an impact upon him of what lay ahead. The impact of one who feared. You find that in the letter to the Hebrews in chapter five, verse seven, I think. The words are spoken, who in the days of his humiliation was heard in that he feared, was heard in his prayer. There were loud cryings, loud, loud cryings, but he was heard of the Father. In that he feared. In that he feared. Now, in that he feared could be because of his holy fear, because of his godly fear. Or it can be because of that fear of what lay ahead. See, he wouldn't have been fully human if he hadn't. There's nothing wimpish about this fear. It just shows the completeness of his manhood, of his humanity. He feared. He sweat as it were great drops of blood in the face of what lay ahead. And the fear was so great that we find there is a sinless recoil from what lay ahead. This cup of afflictions, this furnace of affliction that he must pass through. And the words are spoken, let this cup pass from me. It's as if he's saying, if it is not necessary for me to pass through these sufferings, if it is not necessary, let this cup pass from me. It would be masochism to pass through these sufferings unnecessarily. It would be sinful, therefore, to pass through these sufferings unnecessarily. At the very moment of speaking these words, But it is necessary, as I'm there with them. My people cannot be saved in any other way. The mercy and wisdom and grace of God can never, cannot be revealed in any other way. And therefore there's a holy resolve, not my will, that thy will be done. Holy resolve to go through. But that brings us on from Gethsemane itself. It brings us to the cross and particularly these three hours of darkness and the horror of darkness that I speak of. And we can look at that as follows. We can look at it as the condemnation that he passed through. We can look at it, the wrath that he bore. And we can look at it, the curse that he had to endure. Because all of these are part and parcel of the trouble of soul. The condemnation or the guilt of each and every one who was laid upon him. The weight of that guilt he must bear. He must come as close to sin. He must come into close proximity with that guilt and sin. and this is the Holy One. That proximity, that close proximity is itself a major trauma. He must bear the wrath of God. That wrath of God of which the psalmist says, who knows the power of thy wrath? Well, here is one who came to know the power of that wrath. It was there in different forums. It was there in a cat calling at the fruit of the cross, if thou be the son of God, come down from the cross and save thyself. It was there in the venting of the spleen of the angels of darkness. This was their power. This was their hour. It was there particularly in the loss of the conscious fellowship of his father. The loss of that, it was there, that wrath was particularly there in that forum. The loss of the conscious comfort of our Father's presence. That which had been meet and drink to Him throughout eternity. Within eternity, there was the delight that there was there father in the son, the father in the spirit, the son in the spirit, and the father, mutual delighting in the quintessences and perfections of one another. It was there in time, in all the sufferings that were there up till now, He was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. They called him Beelzebub. In all of these times of grief and sorrow, we find that he could resort, even on evening, into a hill, often in his own, and engage in conversation and prayer with the fathers, and to have the comfort and consolation of that fellowship there. But when we come to the cross, that is withheld. And that is a major part of the expression of the wrath of God towards and against him. And remember, he bore that wrath intensively in his own person. If you and I, may the Lord avert it in his mercy, we pass into a lost eternity, we shall bear that wrath extensively in our own passions throughout the endless ages of eternity. It will be partial doubt, as it were, ongoingly throughout. It will not use the anguish of it, but it will be extensively borne. The Son of God bore that wrath of God intensively in his own person. Like the vials of wrath that we speak of in the book of Revelation, we find in the book of Revelation, poured out on his head in a limited duration of time. such that we cannot enter into the depths that he passed through. I don't want in deep fire to sink, for standing there is none. In the Roman place of hell deserving sinner. And he bore the curse bore the condemnation, he bore the wrath, and he bore the curse. Difficult to distinguish between the wrath and the curse, they run into one another. Insofar as we can distinguish them, we can say that the curse is equivalent to expulsion from the presence and the favor of God. I'm told that the word for blessing and the word for cursing in the Hebrew is one and the same. At the end of time, that great day of judgment, the words which be spoken, come ye blessed. They will be bitten to come into union and communion with the glorious triune God, into fellowship and communion with the holy God. but there will also be spoken, depart ye cursed. Depart into that place prepared for the devil and his angels. Christ bore the equivalent of that, depart ye cursed. He bore the hell, the equivalent of the hell of his people. I say equivalent because it's not completely an exact copy. Those who pass into a lost eternity will experience despair throughout all eternity. Christ's faith, the faith remains strong. Even when he couldn't say, my father, and he didn't have the conscious comfort of a father's presence, by faith he could say, my God, my God. The equivalent is there of that hell. And that must be, that's why it's so difficult to distinguish between the wrath and the curse. Surely they go together. But there is also, in that curse, what we find, the anti-type, as it were, of what is typified in the Old Testament Scriptures by the two goats. One was slain and another, was kept alive. One slain is often sacrificed. The one that was kept alive was led by a fit man, presumably ceremonially fit, into the wilderness and there to be released where he could never be found again. While Christ is not only the sacrifice the sin offering, bearing the sin offering which spoke of the wrath of God, the sarath. That's a word in the Hebrew. It's an alliterative word. It speaks of a destructive wrath. It speaks of unbearing the damnation due to his people as sinners. But he bore that. livingly. He bore it, he bore the hell of his people, he bore it livingly, livingly like the living goat, led into the wilderness, bearing that curse. It's there that we find the cry, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? We can look into that just for a moment, what we understand by that forsaking. It can't mean any breach in the unity of the Trinity. It wasn't that. But it was, as I've said already, the loss of the conscious comfort of the Father's fellowship. but led into the wilderness bearing that accursedness in the Roman place of his people. And he has put that down, down in the wilderness of, I don't know, where none can find it. He has borne it to the full. so that it can't be found by you today, believers. It is on him. He has fully satisfied claims of God's holy justice in your Roman place. He bore that damnation. And in the words of Rabbi Duncan, he did it lovingly. It wouldn't have been sufficient if it hadn't been done lovingly, if it had just been done in the efficiency of the letters. You can do something completely and like that, outwardly, in the efficiency of the letter, but it must be done in the true spirit to be a complete sacrifice. and he did it in that complete spirit. Paul could say, he loved me and gave himself for me, which would indicate that he loved each and every one of his people in whose place he stood as he bore that damnation in their Roman place. It wasn't in a spirit of bitterness. It wasn't in a spirit of, I don't deserve this. I'm just doing it for them. It was lovingly. And he did it in a spirit of love to the father who must lay that holy oppression to his charge. There's the equivalent there of, to do thy will, I take thy life. and therefore it's a complete transaction. He entered into that damnation to the full. He has left nothing undone. He has stood in my Roman place, the believer can say. Nothing has been left undone. Notice, just in finishing, he bore that wrath, he bore that hell of his people. The father must pay it to his charge. Nevermore, however, was he loved of the father. than he was loved at that very time. Even when he was crying, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? That cry of dereliction. Bible says that he grew in favor with God and man. grew in favour as he grew his obedience. We can't only speak of his humanity here, because as a divine person there couldn't be any change, but as the mediator he is man, and as man he is growing in obedience, and the obedience that reached its zenith here in the cross. And that obedience reaching its zenith in the cross nevermore was he loved, as it were, of the Father, and he was loved here. Notice that he was both the sin offering and he was the burden offering at the same time. He was the sin offering bearing the wrath and curse of God. The destructive wrath, that's a wrath of God. But it's the burnt offering, and the burnt offering, as you know, represented the consecration of his will. To do thy will, I take delight. And we have to take in both. He was under the wrath, the curse of God, and he was an object of the Father's love at the same time. Let us pray. We thank Thee, gracious God, our Savior, for the completeness of the obedience that was rendered in the Roman place of such as I am, that there was no pulling back. And in the midst of the comfortlessness of the cross, in the midst of the temptations that were there, in the venting of the spleen of the princes of darkness, if you be the Son of God, come down from the cross. In the light of the providence that seemed to be saying that is true, Nevertheless, that prayer was heard. Save me, O God. Enable me, O God, to pass through all this. Enable me to fulfill all that is required here. Enable me to bear the sufferings in their completeness to the uttermost. We thank Thee that He was enabled. We thank Thee that He lived by faith even here. We thank Thee for the completeness of that obedience of faith. We thank Thee for the way that has been opened for hell-deserving sinners. through and in him. Who is a God like unto thee, that pardons iniquity, passes by the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance, who does not retain anger for ever, because he delights in mercy? May we be filled with wonder this day at the depths, the ocean depths of mercy that are set before us in Him. When they were saying, come, eat, dine. When they were saying, when it is spoken to us, take, eat. This is my body broken for you. And the cup represents before us the new covenant in his blood. The words of peace, the words of holy love. Covenant ratified, the commitment made to do us nothing but good. Make Him precious to us. Go before us. Take away our iniquity and sin. In His precious name, Amen.