Plot Twist: Jesus didn’t wear Birkenstocks

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be diving into Isaiah 53 as a congregation. This week’s brief reflection focuses on Isaiah 53:1-6 and how these few scriptures show us a picture of the physical person of Jesus.

From paintings, pictures, TV shows, and children’s bible stories, Jesus is commonly portrayed as a long brown-haired gentle spirit, kissing sheep and babies and making everyone feel good. He is always wearing a white robe and first-century Birkenstocks. In some portrayals, he has a ruggedly attractive appearance; in others, a British accent. In what may be considered the most accurate Hollywood portrayal of Jesus, he speaks Aramaic, but is still portrayed by a handsome white man.

So what’s the problem?

We injected attractive physical qualities and removed the severity of his suffering so following Jesus would look like it would bring us more societal comfort. If Jesus looks attractive, following him must be, too. But that wasn’t what Jesus experienced. Not even close.

Isaiah prophecies in chapter 53 that Jesus was “despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief… and we esteemed him not,” (Isaiah 53:3-4). Jesus was not someone who was respected, honored, or seen as blessed or favored in society. The Gospels contain accounts of plotting to discredit and eventually kill him.

Furthermore, the prophecy tells us Jesus wasn’t what was considered attractive: “He had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him,” (Isaiah 53:2). Verses 3-4 said he was “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief … one from whom men [hid] their faces.”

But this was our Savior, Jesus Christ, in the flesh. The Word of God dwelling among us. Thus, more importantly than feeling comfortable in an image of God incarnate, we need an accurate image of who Jesus was on earth.

And this is why we need chapters like Isaiah 53. We need to be reminded that Jesus’s persecution wasn’t someone giving him a hard time on social media. His persecution wasn’t hemp cord tied around his wrists or a rock in his Birkenstocks.

We need to experience the uncomfortable reminders, wake up calls even, that Jesus endured sorrow and pain and persecution so great that his death would seem a mercy after what he had endured.

Despite all of this, even while we were still enemies of God, he did it for us (Isaiah 53:4, Romans 5:8). When we didn’t give Jesus a second look, while we were the ones standing in the crowd thinking, Finally this guy is getting what’s coming to him, "he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed," (Isaiah 53:5) because "the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all," (Isaiah 53:6).

May the Lord lead us in love to even deeper truth of himself, and may we be humble to accept it.