Isaiah 53:4-6 English Standard Version (ESV)

⁴ Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.
⁵ But 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.
⁶ All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way;

There is a portion of these passages that our flesh screams; “It’s not my fault!” The words are “pierced for our transgressions”. If we are unwilling to accept that it is our sins for which Christ died, then we are willfully ignoring the free gift offering of salvation. The truth is that we do not go to hell for our sins, we go to hell because we did not accept the offer of salvation by faith. We cannot accept this gift by intellect, it has to be received by faith.

Changing one’s mind does not change one’s heart.

God’s only desire since creating this world and all that is in it was to be loved. He created mankind to love and be loved. God has been showing us how to love and we have failed to love Him as perfectly as He loves us. We can see the first principle of love in His first commandment, fidelity.

Exodus 20:3 English Standard Version (ESV) “You shall have no other gods before^[a] me.”

Footnotes: a Or besides

Mankind has known no greater pain than rejection. It is personal and insulting to have the one we love being unfaithful. The greatest and least used title for Christ is Faithful. His fidelity to the Father and to us, His bride, is unmatched.

Exodus 20:3 was not the first thing God said. Love must first declare itself.

Exodus 20:2 English Standard Version (ESV) “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.”

God declared His love for His creation with only the hope of being loved in return.

Romans 3:25 English Standard Version (ESV)  whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.

Propitiation means acceptable substitute, His death for ours, atoning for our sins. This is only acceptable by faith in Christ. Belief without faith is no belief at all. The intellectual acceptance by a reasoning mind does not allow us to “enter into His rest”.

Romans 6:3 English Standard Version (ESV) Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?

Intellect cannot show you how to enter into His death. Only faith can lead you there. This partaking of the bread of life, the life, death, and resurrection can only happen by faith.

2 Peter 1:4 English Standard Version (ESV) by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.

Intellect only wants to escape punishment. Faith desires to escape corruption by partaking in the divine nature which is only accessible by faith.

Hebrews 10:19-20 English Standard Version (ESV)

The Full Assurance of Faith

¹⁹ Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, ²⁰ by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh,

This portion of Hebrews was entitled “The Full Assurance of Faith” to emphasize that the only assurances we have are by faith. Our intellect will not get us into the faith promises.

Isaiah 53:4 English Standard Version (ESV)  Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.