THREE OF TITLES OF THE LORD JESUS
Trevor R Campbell
I have been led, beloved brethren, to speak of three titles of the Lord Jesus: the Man of sorrows; the Man of patience; and the Man of joy. The Man of patience and the Man of joy are not exactly scriptural expressions, but I think you will see as we proceed that He is worthy, and we are entitled to view and to appreciate the Lord, as the Man of patience and the Man of joy.
Firstly, to consider the Man of sorrows: what food He is for our souls. If any of our younger brethren or us all have not read Mr Darby’s poem, ‘The Man of Sorrows’, I would commend it to you. We have three hymns in our hymnbooks that are part of it, but read it, ‘The Man of sorrows’, and contemplate the One that is spoken of. What a life the Lord Jesus led, “a man of sorrows”, as we have read the prophet Isaiah writes, “and acquainted with grief”. I feel measured as to what I can say in relation to the depth of that sorrow, but lying behind that pathway of sorrow was love for you and for me. He was “a man of sorrows” because of us. I trust that touches your affections, beloved. Think of what it meant to Him as the Lord of glory coming into this scene and seeing the ravages of sin upon the human race. We could never measure the depth of sorrow which entered into the Lord’s heart in relation to sin. Sin would have been a constant source of sorrow to Him. If the scripture says of Lot, a man so practically away from God, “tormented his righteous soul” (2 Pet 2: 8) in relation to what he saw and what he heard in Sodom, how much more, beloved, the Lord Jesus, the One ”who knew not sin” (2 Cor 5: 21); of whom it says, “in him sin is not” (1 John 3: 5), and “who did no sin”, 1 Pet 2: 22. How blessed it is to contemplate that blessed Man here. Think of the afflictions, what He endured at the hands of men, and then those that were inflicted. Think of the sorrow in relation to what sin had brought about in man. What it meant to Him when faced with every affliction down here that man was under. Did it not all bear upon Him? How much was on account of sin? The sorrows, too, of men were His in heart. He bore their sicknesses, and carried their infirmities; not a sorrow nor an affliction He met that He did not bear on His heart as His own. “In all their affliction He was afflicted”, Isa 63: 9. How blessed to take account of such a Man in a world of sin, yet apart from it, but feeling in its intensity what the sorrow was, and He bore it.
As Mr Darby writes in ‘The Sufferings of Christ’, ‘He bore in His spirit what He would take away in His power’, vol 7 p172. Think of what sorrow entered into that life, what was compressed, you might say, into these three and a half years when He was here under the eye of God, under the will of God, in perfection, but feeling the sorrow of such a path. That pathway led to the cross. Think of these movements:
The Man of sorrows wends His way (Hymn 245).
In John’s gospel chapter 12 the Lord Jesus says, “Father, save me from this hour”. He says, “Now is my soul troubled”, v 27. He knew in its entirety where that pathway of sorrow would lead Him.
And then what food for our souls it is to take account of the Man of sorrows in Gethsemane. Think of what He bore there at the prospect of that cup that He accepted from the Father! Only He knew what was in that cup and the depth of it. How we can apply to the Lord the words, “see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow”, Lam 1: 12. These things are for our contemplation, beloved, the Man of sorrows, and there in Gethsemane bearing in His spirit all that was before Him. May our hearts go out to Him! He went that way for you, the One who had the right to everything in this scene, yet He came into this world and was found as a Man of sorrows. It is food for our souls.
He had known desertion, betrayal and denial; yet He bore it all. Then on the cross, we can think of Him bearing every indignity that man could bring to bear and could put upon Him. He bore it from His creatures. What sorrow. And then it says in Lamentations, “Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me”. He “looked for sympathy, but there was none; and for comforters, but … found none”, Ps 69: 20. He was “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief”. And then we come to the forsaking by His God. May our hearts go out to Him, beloved; may your heart be touched in relation to that blessed One! There is no one like Him.
And then I turn to Ephesians because I think you see both the Man of patience and the Man of joy in this one scripture. When the Lord was here, He was a Man of patience, was He not? If you go to the Psalms, it says, “I waited patiently for Jehovah; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry”, Ps 40: 1. That was in His life here, the patient One, always looking, His ear inclined to the Father’s voice. How blessed. He was waiting for the call, waiting for the Father’s will. In John 11 when the Lord waited these three days, Lazarus had died, and the Lord waited. Things were being worked out. The Lord never moved ahead of the Father’s will. What contemplation for our souls and at the present time He is a Man of patience, waiting the Father’s time, the time of the rapture when we shall go to be with Him. It will be soon. It is in the Father’s time, and the Lord is waiting patiently. What is He doing in the waiting time? He is active. The Man of patience is active in relation to His assembly. Think of that, beloved, His chief interest at the present time. It says, “that he might sanctify it, purifying it by the washing of water by the word”. How blessed. That work is continuing, I venture to say, at the present time when the Lord is serving His own. He is looking at every blemish He sees to gently wipe it away. Anything that is in my heart that is not in keeping with Him, He is gently working, using ministry, using His own voice, the voice of the Spirit, working gently with each one of us that these blemishes might be removed, “washing of water by the word”. How patient He is.
But then, too He is a Man of joy. What is before Him? While He was here, think of what His time here was to Him. While there was the sorrow that we have spoken of, there were joys. He says, “I came out from the Father … and go to the Father”, John 16: 28. What joy that must have been to the Lord’s heart that that was assured, but beloved brethren, the Lord’s joy at the present time is in the assembly. It is what His chief interest is, and He is waiting patiently for that fulness of joy when He will have the assembly, when He will have His own eternally with Himself. Think of the Lord saying to His own, “I go to prepare you a place”, John 14: 2. Was that not a matter of joy that a place was going to be prepared for His own? How blessed these things are.
I commend these thoughts to you, beloved. These features of sorrow, patience and joy are to have a reflection in ourselves. Some of our brethren are going through times of sorrow, but the Lord uses times of sorrow. What a thing it is. While we are here, there is so much to distract us. The poet said,
I walked a mile with Pleasure;
She chatted all the way;
But left me none the wiser
For all she had to say.
I walked a mile with Sorrow,
But, oh. the things I learned from her,
When Sorrow walked with me.
Robert Browning Hamilton (1867-1950)
How blessed. We know times of sorrow. Beloved, we have been through times of sorrow. It is a sorrow that we do not have brethren that we once walked with available to us; we feel that. The Lord feels it. In John 6, was it not a matter of sorrow to Him when He said, “Will ye also go away?”, v 67. What a matter. Let us cleave to the Lord Jesus. Peter says, “Lord, to whom shall we go?” v 68. Let us cleave to Him, cleave to the truth and cleave to Paul’s ministry. We speak of these things but let them be real. The practical matters that enter into Paul’s ministry, let them be real to us. Let the Spirit have sway in our hearts as we take account of the pathway of sorrow.
And then it is a pathway of patience too but in the waiting time, beloved, we can be assured of divine resource. When the Lord was here, He had the Father and the Spirit and so do we. Paul writes to the Thessalonians and he says to them, “But the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and into the patience of the Christ”, 2 Thess 3: 5. What a thing to know. It is what lies behind the believer’s walk, “the love of God”, and it is a time of patience when we are waiting for the Lord to come.
May we redeem the time for there is joy before us. How blessed. What a hope we have. He is a Man of joy, looking forward to that time when He will rapture us to be with Himself. What joy, therefore, should be in our hearts. How blessed to have Christ in your heart and the hope of His coming.
I commend these thoughts to you: the Man of sorrows - may we contemplate all that the Lord Jesus has done, all that He has borne. He is a Man of patience, but He is a Man of joy, and so it will be when we shall see Him face to face. Think of that. What joy. What will it be to see the Lord for the first time face to face? May it be our portion, and may we be encouraged in the waiting time and may the Lord bless the word.
Dundee
12th April 2025