Passage

Isaiah 53:4-9
"Surely our griefs He Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted. [5] But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed. [6] All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him. [7] He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth. [8] By oppression and judgment He was taken away; And as for His generation, who considered That He was cut off out of the land of the living For the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due? [9] His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth."

Introduction

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, members of over 5,500 branch churches in Korea and all over the world including the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Honduras, Peru, Bolivia, El Salvador, Argentina, Germany, France, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Estonia, Belgium, Netherlands, China, Japan, Pakistan, Nepal, Indonesia, Philippines, Taiwan, India, Mongolia, Egypt, Israel, Kenya, Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Nigeria, Swaziland, South Africa, Botswana, Cote d'Ivoire, Gabon, and local sanctuary members, those who are attending the service on the Internet all over the world, and television viewing audiences,
Today is one week before the Easter, and this is the 'Palm Sunday'. From today until this Saturday is the 'Passion Week', and at this time, let us review how Jesus spent this week at that time.
I will tell you what Jesus did during the Passion week on a daily basis. That is I will explain what he did each day. First, Jesus entered the city of Jerusalem on this day, Palm Sunday, about 2,000 years ago. At that time a large number of people waved the palm branches as they welcomed Him with frenzied excitement.
Jesus entered the city of Jerusalem on Sunday, and as recorded in Luke 19:47, He taught the word of God in the temple of Jerusalem, and at night He went to Bethany.
The next day, on Monday, Jesus cleared the temple by driving out those who were selling things and exchanging money in the temple.
On Tuesday, a group of high priests came to Jesus and asked Him many questions to find fault in Him, but He answered with His authoritative and wise words.
So, the high priests began to seek other ways to arrest and kill Jesus. In the evening of that Wednesday, Jesus came to Bethany and Mary, the sister of Lazarus, who had been dead for four days but brought back to life, brought a very expensive and precious perform of pure nard and poured it on Jesus' head.
At that moment, Judas Iscariot did not like it, and rebuked Mary for wasting the perfume that was very expensive. But Jesus said in Mark 14:8, "She has done what she could; she has anointed My body beforehand for the burial," and told them to speak of what she had done in memory of her.
Then, Judas Iscariot went to the high priests and promised to hand over Jesus, and then looked for a chance to hand Him over.
In the evening on Thursday, Jesus didn't go to Bethany, but had the Passover Supper in the city of Jerusalem. Afterward, He went to Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives and prayed.
Jesus prayed so fervently to fulfill His duty with all His strength that His sweat became like the drops of blood falling to the ground. But, His disciples fell asleep, not being able to overcome the tiredness.
Jesus woke them up and told them twice, "Keep watching and praying, that you may not come into temptation." But the disciples still fell asleep because of their tiredness.
When Jesus came to wake them up the third time, it was close to midnight on Thursday, and at that moment Judas Iscariot appeared along with the men of the high priest.

While Jesus was on His way to the Mount of Olives, He said in Matthew 26:31, "You will all fall away because of Me this night, for it is written, 'I will strike down the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered.'" As spoken, when Jesus was arrested, the disciples ran away.
While Jesus was being taken to the court of Annas, the high priest, by the men of high priest, midnight passed and it was now Friday.
After Jesus was arrested, at first, as written in John 18:13, He was questioned in the court of Annas the high priest, and then He was sent to Caiaphas, the high priest of that year to be questioned. In the meantime, as written in Luke 22:66, when the day broke, the high priests and the scribes put Jesus before the Council, and they finally condemned Jesus as a criminal to be executed.
Then, they took Him to the Praetorium of Pilate the governor sent by the Roman Empire.
Pilate heard the accusations of the high priests against Jesus, but he couldn't find any guilt in Jesus. He knew that Jesus belonged to Herod's jurisdiction and sent Him to Herod, but Herod sent Jesus back to Pilate again.
Finally, Pilate could not refuse the strong demands of the Jews and passed the verdict to scourge Jesus and crucify Him.
Jesus finally was crucified to fulfill the way of the redemption through the cross.
Then, on the third day after the crucifixion, in the morning of that Sunday, He broke the authority of death and resurrected to open the way of salvation of the cross. Jesus knew that He was going to resurrect after He was crucified, but until He fulfilled the providence of the cross completely, He could not have rest in His heart.
Once, He spoke about this pressure in Luke 12:50 saying, "But I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is accomplished!"
Now, what kind of heart did Jesus have until He took the heavy cross, which was an unbearable burden for a man?
When I tell you about what kind of heart Jesus had when He fulfilled the providence of the cross, I hope you can also check yourself as to with what kind of spiritual heart you are taking your cross .
Also, I pray in the name of the Lord that you will deeply understand what kind of heart God wants you to have, so that you will also have the heart of the Lord in your heart.

Body

Dear brothers and sisters, the heart of our Lord, first of all, was the heart of complete obedience to the will of God.
Complete obedience is to obey the will of God in any kind of situation, even if it does not agree with your thoughts and opinion. Regardless of whether it agrees with your opinion or not, you say just 'Amen' and do it just because it's for God's kingdom and just because God wants it.
Jesus certainly did so. 2 Corinthians 1:19 says, "For the Son of God, Christ Jesus, who was preached among you by us by me and Silvanus and Timothy was not yes and no, but is yes in Him."
And Philippians 2:8 says, "Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross."
The crucifixion is one of the cruelest methods of punishment given for a very heinous criminal. He has to take the heavy cross to the crucifixion sight, and being nailed through his hands and feet, he has to receive such great pain until he breathes his last.
Because of the body weight, the wrist where the nail went through will be torn, and insects that smell the blood will begin to suck on him. But Jesus was flogged even before He was crucified, and His whole body was wounded.
The whips of the Roman soldiers had a hook at the edge, and the whip itself had something like particles of glass. So, when they whipped a person once, the glass particles left wounds all over the body, and the hook at the edge ripped off pieces of the flesh.
Jesus was flogged many times with this kind of whip, and He wore the crown of thorns, which was made with strong thorns. He had great pain because of the thorns embedded in His head, and He also shed a lot of blood.
But rather than the pain that He felt with His body, He felt greater pain in His heart.
That pain was caused by the people whose hearts were changed and that were stained with sins although they were created in the image of God.
Also, it was the pain for those foolish people who were still going to the way of death, although God was opening the way of salvation for the sinners until He sacrificed His one and only Son.
Today's passage Isaiah 53:4 also says, "Surely our griefs He Himself bore, and our sorrows He carried; yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted."
But Jesus believed that, once He had fulfilled the providence of the salvation through the cross, God the Father would lead numerous souls to the way of salvation in His great wisdom.
Namely, He looked forward to that, after He was to resurrect and ascend into heaven, God the Father would send the Holy Spirit and lead countless souls to salvation. He was looking up to that God the Father would rejoice and God's glory would be revealed.
With this in mind, Jesus completely obeyed although the way of the cross was such a miserable and painful way to take.
As you spend time during this Passion Week, I hope you will ask yourself some questions and meditate on the obedient heart of Jesus, who obeyed until death, obeying the will of God for Him to take the rugged cross.
"Jesus took the way of such miserable suffering of the cross and obeyed until death, and how much am I obeying the will of God?"
God is not even asking me to take the cross, and how much of the word of God am I obeying that He has given to me for my spirit's well-being and my blessings?
Did I do the things that agreed with my thoughts but did not do the things that did not agree with my thoughts? Also, did I obey only when I felt like it but did not obey when I didn't like something?"
In this Passion Week, I hope you will deeply meditate on the heart of Jesus who obeyed and took the way of miserable and painful cross, so that you will obey not only God the Father but also all other people according to the order of the church.
By doing so, when God the Father searches for obedient children, I hope He will be able to find you.
Since I met God, I had a dream to become an excellent elder of the church who helps those in need like myself in the past.
But unlike my dream, God called me as His servant. I was not a good speaker and I had a very shy temperament so I did not like to stand before many people. But God told me He would make me a revivalist who would preach the gospel all over the world.
All those things were so different from my plan, but when I obeyed His will and walked the way of His servant, God the Father has and is still guiding me still today.
Beginning this year, we will accomplish the mission in Israel, and no matter how difficult the situations are in that country for preaching the gospel, I will obey and go there only because it's the will of God.
When the apostle Paul was about to wrap up his ministry, what kind of confession did he make? Acts 20:23-24 says, "except that the Holy Spirit solemnly testifies to me in every city, saying that bonds and afflictions await me. [24] "But I do not consider my life of any account as dear to myself, so that I may finish my course and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify solemnly of the gospel of the grace of God."
From this Passion Week, I hope all you church members will also become a man of obedience who can obey the will of God completely.
Dear brothers and sisters, the heart of the Lord secondly is the heart of sacrifice. 'Sacrifice' is the heart not to seek one's own but to be able to give out everything of oneself.
Even though there is no guarantee of reward or compensation, you can calmly give everything and of yourself again and again.
When you want to obey the will of God completely, there will be many things that you have to sacrifice in a physical sense.
For example, Jesus told us to give to those who ask us and he who gives is more blessed than he who receives. Then, just to obey this word, you have to give sometimes of your wealth and at other times of your time. But because you think it may result in your loss, you cannot obey it.
In those situations, please think of Jesus who quietly gave up Himself as an atoning sacrifice, even though nobody but God the Father recognized Him.
When Jesus was suffering the pain of the cross as the atoning sacrifice for sinners, He didn't have any complaints or resentment.
He never thought, "Why do I, the Son of God, have to suffer like this? Why do I have to put up with contempt and mockery from My own creatures? I healed the sick and did only good things, but why do they persecute me for no reason?"
Nobody really understood why Jesus had to go through the suffering of the cross, but He didn't even have any resentment about that either. He just quietly offered Himself as the sacrifice of the cross with His love for God the Father and the love he has for the souls who were suffering in sins.
About this, today's passage Isaiah 53:7 says, "He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth; like a lamb that is led to slaughter, and like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, so He did not open His mouth."
Now, many of you members work faithfully for the kingdom of God, but when the things do not go as you want, is there anybody who complains and has some resentment?
In the beginning, you offered your time and money with thanks for the grace of the Lord, but when nobody really recognized your effort and hard work, then did you not have at least some regret or resentment?
The heart of sacrifice is to give yourself again and again even though there is no reward at all. It's already been about a year since I restricted my diet for the church finances. I began this reduced diet so that I might receive God's compassion and so that the blessing for the church would come more quickly.
While I have been on the reduced diet, I never thought, "Why do I alone have to eat so little and tighten my belt? Why can't I spend for myself instead of only helping others who are in need?"
Still, I never told the workers around me to sacrifice with me, but I just asked them to eat well and gain more strength to work more faithfully for the kingdom of God.
Also, as the head of this church, I have been struggling with the convulsions and cramping for such a long time caused by the pressure of taking all the burdens for the kingdom of God. But, I never thought, "Why do I alone have to go this way of such difficulty?"
Now, when you sacrifice yourself, if there are others who do not really sacrifice, does any of you complain saying, "Why do I alone have to sacrifice like this?" Then your heart is different from the heart of the Lord.
Jesus did not open His mouth even when He was in great suffering, and He quietly sacrificed Himself until He breathed His last. And I hope that this heart of Jesus would touch the depth of your heart during this Passion Week.
Dear brothers and sisters, thirdly, the heart of the Lord is the thankful heart. Jesus could sacrifice Himself completely as the atoning sacrifice for the sins of all mankind because He had the thankful heart in Him.
It was the kind of thanks for the countless souls that could be saved through the one sacrifice of Himself. Jesus was thankful that God the Father could gain many true children whom God wanted so much, and Jesus was also thankful that He could fulfill the providence for it to happen.
If you have the thankful heart for the things that will be accomplished through your sacrifice, you will not sacrifice with the sense of being forced but with joy.
It's the case with me, too. I can sacrifice myself with thanks because I believe that with the sacrifice of one person, myself, the church will receive blessings, and the church members will receive blessings in their business fields and workplaces.
Even though I have to tighten my belt more to help those in need and to do world mission, if just one more of our members can gain strength through that, I am thankful.
Also, in far away countries and remote places, if our overseas missionaries can do their mission work in full scale, and if many souls are saved and the kingdom of God is enlarged through that, I don't think it is wasteful to help them with the money I saved. I am rather very thankful.
Usually, because they are trying to have peace in mind, most pastors would not do anything just before they preach. But in my case, I have to meet so many members and pray for them on Sundays and before the Friday all-night services.
But I never thought, "I would like to have some rest. I wish I could deliver the message after having some kind of rest before the service, like other pastors."
I was thankful that our members could receive the answer to their hearts' desire just by touching my hands, so I tried to hold the hands of just one more believer, and I tried to pray for just one more person.
When you try to live in faith and in truth, you may have an occasion where you have to sacrifice yourself to obey the will of God. In this case, I hope you will be thankful looking up to the fruit that will be born through your sacrifice.
Even though you may feel the way you are taking is narrow and rough, you can still be thankful because you will reach eternal life. Even though you may feel it is a little difficult to come to church and pray while the worldly people are taking a rest, you can still be thankful because your soul will prosper, and through that you will receive blessings and you can go to the better heavenly dwelling places. Also, you can be thankful because your family can be evangelized through your sacrifice of humbling yourself and serving others.
While you have this Passion Week, I hope you will be able to more deeply feel the heart of Jesus who took the way of cross with thanks, because of His love for God the Father and for the souls.
If you have this heart of the Lord, you will never think such things as, "Why do I have to live like this? Why do I have to do it all by myself? Can't other people do this?"
You will be thankful for the duty given by God the Father. You will be thankful for the fact that you have love for the souls. You will be thankful that you are going a way through which you can give glory to God.
Also, God is giving you the strength to go this way and the strength and power to pray. I hope you can have perfectly thankful heart for these things, too.

Conclusion

Dear brothers and sisters, this is the first day of the Passion Week, and I talked to you about three aspects of the heart of Jesus who took the cross.
The first is the heart of complete obedience. Latter part of Romans 5:19 says, "through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous." As said, by the obedience of Jesus, countless souls took off their yoke of sins and were made righteous.
That way, they were exempt from the punishment of eternal death, but had received eternal heavenly kingdom.
Secondly, the heart of the Lord is the heart of sacrifice. Through Jesus' sacrifice, the way of salvation was opened for us, and also ways of material and spiritual blessings were also opened.
It is just as today's passage Isaiah 53:5 says, "But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed."
Thirdly, the heart of the Lord is the thankful heart. He was thankful that He could obey God's will and fulfill the providence as His Son, and He was thankful that the ways of salvation and blessings could be opened through one sacrifice of Himself.
I hope the Lord's heart of the obedience, sacrifice, and thanks will also be in your heart so that many fruits will be born through your obedience and sacrifice.
By doing so, I pray in the name of the Lord that you will pay back the love and grace of God the Father who sacrificed His beloved Son for sinners, and you will give joy to God.

[AMEN]