“You boys need to get some meat on those bones!”

We really loved our grandma (on my birth dad’s side). My twin brother Roger and I were frequently deposited with “Little Grandpa,” and she truly spoiled us while we were there. We weren’t sure if it was because our mom favored our little brother who was four years younger, but when you’re being spoiled with fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and farm-fresh vegetables, you don’t really care.

I used to tell people that if you held me up to a light bulb you could see my ribs. But if grandma were to look down from heaven now, I’m not sure if she’d say “Mission Accomplished” or “You took that meat-on-the-bones thing a little further than I was thinking.”

When Jesus came to His people, He had to put a little meat on the bones when it came to understanding the role of the Messiah. God took Ezekiel in the Spirit to a valley. He said this:

“The Spirit of the Lord … set me down in the middle of the valley; it was full of bones. And he led me around among them, and behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley, and behold, they were very dry.” (Ezekiel 37:1-2, ESV)

The Jewish people said “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are indeed cut off” because of their exile in Babylon (37:11), but God had a plan.

The Jews’ expectation was that the Messiah, the promised King from David’s lineage, would be a conquering King who would deliver them from Gentile oppression. In Mark’s Gospel, we see Jesus demonstrating His divine power in miraculous ways. He healed the sick, opened blind eyes, cast out demons, calmed the storm, and raised the dead. So, it wasn’t a surprise when Jesus asked His disciples,

“‘Who do people say that I am?’ And they told him, ‘John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others, one of the prophets.’ And he asked them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’ Peter answered him, ‘You are the Christ.’” (Mark 8:27-29)

At this point, the disciples are thinking, It’s time to march to Jerusalem, but that was not yet to be.

Following Peter’s confession of Jesus as the Messiah, Jesus flipped the script on them three times, telling them, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again” (Mark 8:31). Following the third proclamation of His impending death, He tells them this: “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).

We have the complete Bible in our hands, so we sometimes question how the disciples failed to grasp what we see clearly in Scripture. Jesus was both “the Son of God” and the “Suffering Servant” foretold in Isaiah. If you were a Jew in Israel under Roman occupation, your preference would be for the Messiah, the conquering King, but Jesus the Suffering Servant brought so much more to them and to us.

Isaiah describes for us this Suffering Servant:

“Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. 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. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned — every one — to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:4-6)

God knew that the bondage of sin that Satan imposes on mankind is crueler than any foreign occupier, and it was from that bondage the Suffering Servant came to set us free. “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36).

But one day the Messiah will return, and He will finish the work He promised. Christian artist Brian Doerksen’s classic song, “Come, Now Is the Time to Worship,” has these impactful lyrics: “One day every tongue will confess You are God, One day every knee will bow. Still the greatest treasure remains for those, Who gladly choose You now.”

The true “meat on the bones” of Jesus our King is that He took the penalty for our sins as the Suffering Servant, but He also is the coming King who will make all things new. Let us “gladly choose Him now!”

What say ye, Man of Valor?
Semper Fidelis!