KJV Isaiah 53:2 For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: He hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him

NASB Isaiah 53:2 For He grew up before Him like a tender shoot, And like a root out of parched ground; He has no stately form or majesty That we should look upon Him, Nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him.

Once again, the rich imagery of this verse provides abundant food for our souls. Consider the metaphors: a tender plant and a root out of dry ground.

The Tender Plant

The thought of His growth has been touched on in a previous meditation. But what is stressed here is that He was a “tender” plant, sensitive and sensible to all.

First, and chiefly, He was sensitive to all that would please or displease His Father. The injustice, inequity, and inhumanity all around Him never led to hardening or a sense of comfort with sin. He felt keenly everything that was contrary to the character of God. He grieved as only He could over the condition of humanity and at what God was being deprived of from the lives of men.

We become hardened and accustomed to the sin that is all around us. We make distinctions between certain sins, some being serious and others less so. But to His sensitive soul, everything was contrary to the holiness of His Father, and thus brought Him sorrow.

But not only did He observe their actions and hear their words, but He knew what we do not know —He knew the thoughts and intents of the heart. The hypocrisy and feigned words of the hypocrites, the smooth words of the sycophant, and the thoughts behind the entrapping words of the enemy were all open to His understanding. The seven things that the Lord hates in Proverbs 6 were His environment day by day. He was truly a Man of Sorrows.

The Root Out of the Dry Ground

He was also a “root out of a dry ground.” This expression is open to several possible meanings. He was life amidst a barren and fruitless nation. He was the source of life in a barren world. Also, it could mean that He found nothing here to sustain His life and looked heavenward for everything.

All of this serves as a background for the second half of the verse. Despite all that brought pleasure to the heart of God — the moral beauties and sensitivity in a hardened world, and life amidst a dead world — we saw no beauty in Him. He was without form or comeliness.

He did not possess an arrogant swagger as many despots display. He did not dress in gorgeous apparel to impress His audience. His physical appearance did not impress as did King Saul’s centuries earlier. He did not gather great men around Him —the intellectuals of the day or the politicians. He had a group of mostly Galilean fishermen and a few others – nothing too impressive.

Men looked at Him through the prism of society’s standards and found nothing that struck them as comely or beautiful. He was written off as insignificant and of no special importance.

How thankful we should be that the Spirit of God has anointed our eyes and we gladly own that He is the summation of all that is lovely (Song of Sol. 5:16). We see and trace His beauty, not in His physical appearance or His imposing manner, but in the grace of His ways, the tenderness of His touches, the kindness of His words, and the purity of His heart.

If our eyes could see more clearly, we would discover beauties beyond description in this altogether lovely One. A day is coming when Israel will, in contrast, exclaim, “How great is His beauty” (Zec 9:17).