Esteemed Him Not

He is despised and rejected by men,
​​A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
​​And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him;
​​He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Isaiah 53:3

Esteem: respect and admiration, typically for a person. There was a day when no man gave our Lord Jesus the respect and admiration due the Son of God. We are so embarrassed by that situation that we will even try to deny it. Yet, there He was on the cross, bearing the death of a criminal along with all the sin of you and me. We cannot admire all that sin, even though some portion of it belongs to each of us. Isaiah, Israel, and all the rest of us did not esteem the Lord Jesus on that day. And then came the risen Lord!

Mary Magdalene thought Him a caretaker. A couple of disciples failed to recognize Him. And Thomas refused to believe until he could see and touch Him. Somewhere in the varied reactions and expectations, an example of each of us can be found. I might well have made the same mistaken conclusion that Mary did as my mind has been known to connect a few circuits in the wrong order in times of stress. And Mary had every reason to be stressed as she thought her Savior dead and buried on that Sunday morning. Peter and John had to be informed as they were not there in the cemetery. Peter might well have been sleeping the exhausted sleep of the guilty over his three denials, but the Risen Lord Jesus was going to fix that too.

Each of us may give up the shame of that day when we did not esteem Him, for in the Risen Lord we are healed by His grace. Let go of the unworthiness you think you know and live in the worth beyond compare our Lord has given to each of us by His grace. Once we did despise and reject Him, but in His death and resurrection we are forgiven and reborn to a new life in Him. Now is the time to live in Christ!

His grace, peace and love to you on this Easter Monday!

Bucky