I-64 travels east to west,
For north to south I-95’s the best.
But if the Kingdom of Heaven is where you would be,
Then take the grand highway of I-53.
I-53 carry me home,
No more to stray, no more to roam.
A trail of salvation lined with blood and with tears,
A story told before it started by 600 some years.
From the pen of a prophet is where this highway begins,
Now deep in my heart it heals and it mends.
The plan of my Savior, who came down to this earth,
To pay the price for our sin and give us new birth.
From day one of this mystery its meaning’s been sealed,
Then darkened day in God’s city in clarity revealed.
Who’d believe the King would free us by suffering and shame,
And His pain was for us and would exalt God’s own name.
The King has no horse; the King has no men,
He was left high dry by those He called friends.
Oh children of Israel, say why can’t you see?
The One who fulfilled this great prophecy,
A eunuch was baffled by these words as he read,
Till Phil cast light on just what was said.
The Power of God, His message to man,
Oh what a concept, oh what a plan.
God as a human, in humble disguise,
He suffers immensely and for us He dies.
A mystery for eons this I-53,
Now revealed in our Jesus to you and to me.
Now what shall you do, with these words that are true?
Believe them, receive Him and begin a life new?
Or will you reject them and our Savior as well,
Your soul is forever and He saves souls from hell.
By His stripes we are healed, by His wounds we are saved,
By the Love of our God, I-53 has been paved.
Tertius
The secret things belong to the Lord our God,
but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever,
that we may follow all the words of this law.
Deuteronomy 29:29
A note about “I-53”: Probably my favorite chapter in the Bible is Isaiah 53. The Gospels told about the suffering of Jesus, but not one of them explicitly told why, 600 years before His birth, this chapter does. How can one of the Jewish faith fail to realize who the Messiah is in the very revealing light of this passage? How amazing!
Isaiah 53 (NIV)
53 Who has believed our message
and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?
2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot,
and like a root out of dry ground.
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.
3 He was despised and rejected by mankind,
a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.
Like one from whom people hide their faces
he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.
4 Surely he took up our pain
and bore our suffering,
yet we considered him punished by God,
stricken by him, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
and by his wounds we are healed.
6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to our own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.
7 He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before its shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.
8 By oppression[a] and judgment he was taken away.
Yet who of his generation protested?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was punished.[b]
9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.
10 Yet it was the LORD’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the LORD makes[c] his life an offering for sin,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.
11 After he has suffered,
he will see the light of life[d] and be satisfied[e];
by his knowledge[f] my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.
12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,[g]
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,[h]
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.