God’s Handing It to You

The drawing of the is hand is thought to be the right hand of the artist, Hendrick Goltzius. It could also be the hand of the man Jesus healed in the synagogue – Mark 3:1-6. The only similarity in the drawing and in scripture is there is a man with a withered hand in both. A little back story to what happened to the artist Hendrick Goltzius; according to his friend and biographer Karel van Mander (1548-1606), Hendrick fell into the fire place most likely trying to break his fall with both his hands. His mother tired to nurse him back to health but his hands never healed properly and was in constant pain. Thirty years later Goltzius drew what is possibly his own right hand. He may have had rough dexterity to draw with his left hand.

Here in scripture, Mark 3;1-6, where we don’t have a back story to how this man’s hand become withered we do know that Jesus heals it. And the fact He did it on the sabbath, that’s another blog post.

And he entered again into the synagogue; and there was a man there which had a withered hand.

² And they watched him, whether he would heal him on the sabbath day; that they might accuse him.

³ And he saith unto the man which had the withered hand, Stand forth.

⁴ And he saith unto them, Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath days, or to do evil? to save life, or to kill? But they held their peace.

⁵ And when he had looked round about on them with anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts, he saith unto the man, Stretch forth thine hand. And he stretched it out: and his hand was restored whole as the other.

⁶ And the Pharisees went forth, and straightway took counsel with the Herodians against him, how they might destroy him.

Mark 3:1-6 KJV

There was a word in this passage that stuck out to me; stretch. So I investigated. Strong’s Concordance G1614 – ekteinō, to stretch out, stretch forth. Made sense to me, seemed pretty straight forward. But as I continued to search I came across Acts 4:30 – “ By stretching forth thine hand to heal; and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy holy child Jesus

Stretching here in Acts 4:30 -The following I found on the same page under the Thayer’s Greek Lexicon heading “ἀγκύρας, properly, to carry forward [R. V. lay out] the cable to which the anchor is fastened,(my emphasis) i. e. to cast anchor [“the idea of extending the cables runs into that of carrying out and dropping the anchors” The cable to which the anchor is fastened. Say what?!

“While You stretch out Your hand to cure and to perform signs and wonders through the authority and by the power of the name of Your holy Child andServant Jesus.” (Amplified Bible Classic Editions, emphasis mine). It hit me. Jesus invites us to reach out to Him, to stretch out our hands to Him for healing, for salvation, for a relationship with Him And that hand is “the cable to which the anchor is fastened.” Hebrew 6:19 – “Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; …” (KJV). Jesus, our anchor, is at the other end of that cable.

The Kedge anchor is a real anchor (there’s a story behind the name of this blog, but that’s another blog post too) and kedging is a nautical term; “to draw (a vessel) along by hauling in on the cable of a light anchor that has been dropped at some distance from it, or (of a vessel) to be drawn in this fashion.” Do you see it? That withered hand is us, broken, sinful and in need of healing. Jesus has His hand reaching out to us. We just have to reach out and grasp hold of His hand, the Hand, the cable, that is fastened to the Anchor. Jesus is our hope, “an anchor for our soul, both sure and steadfast…”

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