There is a Hat Rack to Hang the Hat of Sickness, but We Choose to Wear it!

There is a hat rack to hang the hat of sickness, but we choose to wear it!

Matthew eight sixteen and seventeen are revealing verses, when studied in the Greek.

Mt 8:16  When the even was come, they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils: and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were (having or retaining)  sick (evil): King James Version

“and healed all that were sick” …  evil having or retaining, He cured therapeutically.”

The translated Greek says, “Those evil or injurious things having or keeping, Jesus healed.”

Moreover, evening itself coming about, they bring-near to him many themselves being demonized, and he cast- the breaths -out with a word, and he services all those holding injuries. The Awful Scroll Bible Version

The Awful Scroll Bible does a superb job by saying ; “those holding to injuries.”

 17  That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took ( received) our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses. King James Version

I have been a Christian for thirty three years. Many times I find myself retaining, holding or keeping an infirmity or a sickness, and that for a long time.

Human nature is obsessed with worrying about  things which afflict.

Somehow, we calculate that by concentrating on the malady we will attain to something. To what, I don’t know, but I catch myself stuck in this horrible habit.

17  That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took ( received) our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses. King James Version

Verse seventeen is to be understood in context of  sixteen.

Jesus Himself took our infirmities. The word “took”, is “lambano”, which is translated to receive, or get.

Biblical receiving is not a mental ascension. It’s receiving, obtaining and making my own, to implement. The word lambano is what Jesus used to talk about receiving by faith. When Jesus tells us to receive, He expects us to get so that we can use.

On the cross, Jesus received, obtained and made our sicknesses His own. In fact the cross is the “Welcome Sign” for sin. In a weird analogy, His bloodied body represents the refrigerator door for every magnet of sin and disease to be placed on.

Jesus welcomed it then, and welcomes it now.

Humanity is hostile to The One who gladly wants all its junk to be placed on Him.

Jesus is  the “hat rack” where disease can be hung from.  We have a place to hang the hat of sickness but  choose to wear it instead.

Mt 8:16  When the even was come, they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils: and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were (to have)  sick (evil): King James Version

If  we choose to have and keep the injurious and evil things unto ourselves, there is little that Jesus can do for us until we let go.  In proportion to our letting go, we get healed. I think that Jesus is waiting to quickly heal me when I  remit my sickness on Him.

Joh 20:23  Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.

 To remit is the same word used to forgive.  Biblical forgiveness is to send something bad so far away that it’s impossible for it to adversely affect.

Forgiveness is not just an utterance or a confession of heart. It is a physical, emotional and spiritually tangible transference of something evil,  so far from you, that it can no longer influence.

Jesus forgave us. Disease has been forgiven and sent to the hill far way where that old rugged cross stands.

When we remit our sins and those of others, we sent them far to the land of Golgotha. When we keep them, we hold ,and suppress the sickness close to our frail human body. One by-product of suppressing the evil is bitterness.  The gravity of not forgiving yourself and others is that through inaction, you hold, retain, and suppress the evil to yourself.

Happy (makarios) Thursday!