God wanted us at all costs

What a strange thing! It pleased God to bruise him. Ever think about this verse? Yet it pleased God to bruise him; he has put him to grief. (Isaiah 53:10a) It pleased God for him to be crushed. To be pierced through. This really struck me. It pleased God to bruise him.
And I thought, I really wouldn’t be happy to have a father who got pleasure out of my suffering especially the kind of suffering Jesus had to endure. But I realized that God needed to get us back to himself. God wanted us at all costs.
God had watched from the window of heaven, much like the father in the parable of the Prodigal Son – watched for the return of his people, for our return to his household, to his will, to his way.
God had watched through the ages, as we drifted further and further away from him.
God had watched as his covenant with the patriarchs failed to bring Israel closer.
God watched as his words through his prophets failed to bring Israel any closer.
God had watched as isolation and alienation and even death failed to bring Israel any closer.
God, who in sundry times and diverse places had spoken to us through his prophets, now spoke from Calvary, from Golgotha’s hill, in a thunderous voice that still echoes across the ages – through his dear Son, Jesus.
The only acceptable Lamb. The only one who could have endured such suffering and shame.
The one in whom all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether in heaven or on earth, making peace by the blood of his cross. (Colossians 1:19-20). And that is why we worship the Lamb, who is holy. Because God has highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth and things under the earth;
And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:9-11)
And that is why this Lamb, this Jesus, this Lamb who bears the marks of slaughter is the only one found worthy to open the book. This lamb with scars on his head from the thorn of crowns.
This Lamb with holes in his hands from the nails that anchored him to the cross.
This Lamb with slashes in his sides from the sword that pierced him through.
This Lamb is worthy.
And we are made to worship God, to glorify him forever.