Over the next several weeks, the GearTalk Biblical Theology podcast will enjoy A Month in the Servant Songs. Hands to the Plow’s Creative Director, Mark Yaeger, has also designed some great cover art that may serve your ministry as you teach through these gospel-saturated poems from one of the Old Testament’s most well-known prophets. Isaiah’s Servant Songs include Isa 42:1–9; 49:1–13; 50:4–11; 52:13–53:12. They occur in the Bible’s second division (= the Prophets), so the second gear is in yellow in the first speech balloon; yet all Scripture’s gears (= Law, Prophets, Writings, Gospels and Acts, Epistles, and Revelation) influence or draw on Isaiah’s prophecies, which is why all the gears are colored in the second speech balloon.
The Images: PDF / JPEG
The Images with Scriptures: PDF / JPEG
DeRouchie’s Notes on the Servant Songs: PDF
Included in the “album cover” are images from each of the four Servant Songs. The whitened area in each image represents the role of the Servant Savior himself.
- The light piercing into the darkness of a prisoner’s cell comes from Isa 42:6–7, in which Yahweh declares to the Servant the hope of all who find themselves in need of a Savior: “I will give you as a covenant for the people, a light for the nations, … to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.”
- The arrows filling the quiver and the sharp arrow in the bow of the archer come from Isa 49:2, wherein the Servant himself declares how Yahweh readied him for a specific mission to kill in order to save: “He made me a polished arrow; in his quiver he hid me away.”
- The man whose beard is being pulled comes from Isa 50:6, which finds the Servant speaking about the substitutionary suffering he endured en route to his triumph: “I gave my back to those who strike and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.”
- The lamb being led to the slaughter comes from Isa 53:7 and depicts the Servant’s substitutionary sacrificial mission to save the many: “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.”
We at Hands to the Plow Ministries hope your heart is moved to marvel at the majesty of our Servant Savior who came to satisfy God’s wrath and to atone for our sins through his substitutionary victory over the powers of darkness.
Be sure to tune in to the GearTalk Podcast’s A Month in the Servant Songs.
