Strong Enough Not to Need to Crush

Touched on Isaiah 11 the last Lord's Day when preaching about Jesus as the Son of David. As usual I read John Oswalt's excellent commentary on Isaiah in seeking to clarify my understanding of the passage. His remarks below were so trenchant that I included them verbatim in my sermon and post them here for those interested:

“What [Isaiah] does envision is a time when the ruler will no longer see himself as privileged but rather as responsible, when he will become one for whom his people’s welfare is uppermost. In a word, the ruler will be the servant, not because he is too weak to dominate, but because he is strong enough not to need to crush.”

In this Jesus becomes a model for all those in authority and reminds us what our calling is. Wow.