What is Jesus like?

"Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him and he will bring justice to the nations. He will not shout or cry out, or raise his voice in the streets. A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. In faithfulness he will bring forth justice; he will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth. In his law the islands will put their hope."

This is what God the LORD says--he who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and all that comes out of it, who gives breath to its people, and life to those who walk on it: "I, the LORD, have called you in righteousness; I will take hold of your hand. I will keep you and will make you to be a covenant for the people and a light for the Gentiles, to open eyes that are blind, to free captives from prison and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness" (Isaiah 42:1-7).

We have celebrated Christmas, where God the Father sent to earth a Savior from heaven. We have celebrated Epiphany, where we saw that this Savior was not sent just to the Jews, but to everyone. We know who this Savior is—He is Jesus Christ, Son of God and Son of Man. But we haven’t really talked about what Jesus is like. What kind of person is our Immanuel?

Through Isaiah the prophet, God the Father tells us of Jesus’ personality. He begins Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight. It is important that we understand that Jesus’ personality is pleasing to His Father. The way that Jesus conducts Himself, the way that He solves problems, His goals and priorities, all of these give His heavenly Father great delight. And it all starts with servanthood—the Father begins His description of Jesus with the words Here is my servant.

Servanthood is not a popular concept among humans. To serve implies being inferior to others, and no one likes to think of himself as inferior. Especially here in America, talk of servanthood is met with resistance. In our country we are taught that everyone is supposed to be equal—to serve another seems almost un-American! But such a view of life is built on sinful pride. Even Jesus’ disciples were not immune from this kind of thinking; in Mark chapter 9 we read: They came to Capernaum. When he was in the house, he asked them, "What were you arguing about on the road?" But they kept quiet because on the way they had argued about who was the greatest. Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, "If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all." The night of the Last Supper, Jesus even went so far as to wash the feet of His disciples, a dirty job normally reserved for lowly servants; after He had finished, Jesus told them "Do you understand what I have done for you?…You call me `Teacher' and `Lord,' and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you" (John 13:12-15). Jesus emphasizes the importance of loving service to others because He lives by this principle; Jesus said: the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many (Matthew 10:28).

It is this dedication to loving service that causes the Father to esteem His Son so highly. In John chapter 10 Jesus says: The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life--only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father. Notice Jesus’ attitude of servanthood. He was willing to do the dirtiest, most painful work imaginable—allowing Himself to be put to a shameful death by sinful men. Jesus performed this disgraceful work out of love for us, because our sin-filled lives would have led God to condemn us to the punishment of hell unless Jesus suffered that punishment in our place instead. But being the perfect servant that He is, Jesus did not just go off on His own to die for us—He only gave up His life with the permission of His Father. This inspired Paul to write: Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death--even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:5-8)

Going back to Isaiah, we next read: I will put my Spirit on him. We find this text fulfilled in Luke 3:21-22, where we are told: When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased." We might wonder: why was it necessary for God the Father to send the Holy Spirit to Jesus, when Jesus is God’s Son? The reason is that Jesus was born both true God and true man. The work of saving all mankind from sin would be very difficult, and where the divine nature of the Son of God was up to the task, the human nature of the Son of Man needed the Spirit of God to keep Him strong through the trials to come. Jesus had come as the perfect loving servant to do the Father’s will—to redeem all mankind—and the Father thus equipped Jesus with the Holy Spirit so that He could do this important work successfully.

Isaiah next records God saying: he will bring justice to the nations. Justice is the nature of God. Good must be rewarded and evil must be punished. But justice without mercy is a hollow justice. The whole point of justice is to protect love from the attacks of hatred; but if there is no love in justice, justice betrays its very purpose. This is what compelled Jesus to offer His life to save us. God loves good and hates evil. Since every human being is corrupted with the evil of sin, all that humankind is entitled to from God is His terrible anger. But since God is perfectly just, He is also perfectly merciful—so our Lord Jesus chose to make the sacrifice of accepting His Father’s punishment for our sins. He did this so that we could be offered the opportunity to live in God’s favor by seeking refuge in the arms of the Son with whom He is well pleased.

Jesus brings justice that is shaped by love. We all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23); none of us deserves any mercy from our Lord. But Jesus chooses to offer us hope before the coming Judgement. It is not Jesus’ style to yell at us for all our mistakes; Isaiah records: He will not shout or cry out, or raise his voice in the streets. Scripture only records Jesus acting in anger when He clears the Temple of those who were misusing God’s house as a place to conduct business (John chapter 2). No, Jesus’ style is to calmly confront us with our sins, show us our need to change our ways, offer us His forgiveness, and urge us to follow His leadership through life. Jesus never acts impulsively; Jesus’ behavior is never out of control. Every action, every word that comes from His lips is carefully designed to draw our attention away from fascination with worldly things so that He can speak to us of heavenly things.

Does all this make Jesus sound tender and caring and loving? It should, because His Father tells us: A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. A reed is a fragile plant stalk; when it becomes bruised, it is very easy to accidentally break off the end of the stalk entirely. Jesus is never careless; Jesus is never thoughtless. All too often, we are like fragile reeds—life bruises us and we feel as if just one more problem will break us in half. But Jesus is tender with us—when we are bruised by life, He takes care to see that while we may be bruised, we will not be broken. Jesus stands beside us, holds us up and gives us His support until the bruises heal.

A smoldering wick makes us think of a burning candle. You know how easy it is for even a small puff of air to blow out a little flame. When a wick is merely smoldering, when the flame is not much more than a dull orange glow, it takes next to nothing to extinguish the fire entirely. Our faith can sometimes seem like a smoldering wick. There are times in almost every Christian’s life when God seems far away, uninterested in your problems and unresponsive to prayer. At such times it becomes easy to doubt your faith, doubt that God really loves you, doubt that He exists at all. During such dark times, the Christian’s faith seems to be on the verge of going out. But the Father reassures us that even in the times of our greatest weakness, Jesus is present and Jesus does care. When our faith is smoldering, barely hanging on to a dull glow, Jesus does not give up on us in disgust at our weakness; our Lord does not snuff out the embers of a weak faith. Rather, our Lord is patient; He nurtures our faith over time, gradually building it up into a strong flame, just as campers must use patience over time to build a campfire from nothing more than a tiny spark. Jesus is always attentive to prayers like the one recorded in Mark chapter 9: Immediately the boy's father exclaimed, "I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!"

Our reading continues: In faithfulness he will bring forth justice; he will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth. Our Lord Jesus is faithful—He is faithful to His Father and He is faithful to us. Jesus brings justice into our unjust world—a justice that satisfies the requirements of holiness because unrepented sin is punished, a justice that serves love by being merciful to those who repent of their wrongdoings and cling to Jesus for mercy. And because of the Father’s gift of the Holy Spirit, Jesus never becomes discouraged in His work. We often become frustrated, even depressed, over the state of morals in this world. We become discouraged when we look at how many people don’t make time for Christ in their lives on any kind of regular basis. But Jesus doesn’t look at numbers; Jesus looks at each individual soul. Jesus doesn’t count how many people live their lives in the shadow of hell; instead, He focuses on the salvation of each individual man, woman, and child, and rejoices when any person rejects the allure of sin and turns to Him for forgiveness. Jesus never falters or becomes discouraged, because every day there are many additions to the membership of His kingdom.

Finally, God says of Jesus: In his law the islands will put their hope. An island is usually a remote place, a spot cut off from what is going on in the rest of the world. We are reassured that even in the isolated places, even in the islands, people are placing their hope for a meaningful life and rescue from the grave into the hands of the Savior who they know will judge them with mercy. Jesus’ teachings, Jesus’ promises, Jesus’ help are everywhere, among all people. This shows the importance of living in a relationship with Jesus—His work, done on our behalf to please the Father, is so important, so valuable, that God has sent news of it everywhere, and everywhere that the name of Jesus is spoken, there are people who rejoice in the Good News.

What is Jesus like? He is everything that we desire to be—He is obedient to His Father, He serves the needs of others before taking care of His own needs, He is never confused in figuring out the right thing to do, He is never carried away by His emotions. Jesus is dependable, patient, honest, caring and supportive. He is never discouraged by the tough times; He finds joy in every person who renounces pride and asks for forgiveness. This is what our Lord Jesus is like. This is the Son of Man who delights the heavenly Father. This is the Son of God who is committed to your welfare. This is the person that we all want to become more like.