behind His back

"...It is You who has kept my soul from the pit of nothingness, 

for You have cast all my sins behind Your back."

~Isaiah 38:17

Have you ever tried to pass off some ridiculous statement (like "Thou shalt not eat thy vegetables") as Scripture by saying it's found in the book of Hezekiah?  Maybe that's just my husband.  And if you have known us for any length of time, odds are you've heard that joke already!

While Hezekiah didn't write a book of the Bible, he was a king who received prophecies from Isaiah starting in Chapter 37.  In this chapter, Hezekiah's prayers and reliance on God resulted in the ultimate defeat of the invading Assyrians.  In the next chapter, we find Hezekiah on his deathbed.  Desperate, he prays to God asking Him to remember how he has walked before Him "in truth and with a whole heart" (verse 3).  God then decides to heals him, and also adds fifteen years to his life (verse 5).

Hezekiah's writing of his illness and healing makes up the rest of the chapter.  It describes both despair and thanksgiving.  One verse in particular stood out of me as I read it today:

"It is You who has kept my soul from the pit of nothingness,

for You have cast all my sins behind Your back" (verse 17).

Check out the word "cast."  It immediately brought me to 1 Peter 5:7, which instructs us to "cast" all our cares or anxiety on Him because He cares for us.  I'm not sure if the word "cast" is translated exactly the same in Isaiah as it is in 1 Peter, but to me the mental picture is the same; throwing something with all our might toward another source, as a fisherman would cast a net into the sea.

That's what God did with Hezekiah's sin, and what He does with all of our sins when we accept His son and ask for forgiveness.  He throws our sin with all of his might behind Him.  When He said "Get behind me, Satan!" (Matthew 16:23 and Mark 8:33) He was putting Peter's wrong thinking where it belonged...behind Him.  When something is behind you, it's not in your line of vision.  It is impossible to focus on it, or even see it, unless you look behind you.  When it comes to our sin, God is not one for looking behind, and He doesn't expect us to do that either.  If we ask His forgiveness, He forgets our sin and only looks ahead to what we could be in Him.

The point is, whether we're casting our sin or our anxieties on Him, God will greet us with open arms.  Throw that struggle, stronghold, worry, or temptation into His hand with all your might, and He will smile and throw it over His shoulder.  Remember, if God cared at all about keeping tabs on our sin even after He forgives us, He would never throw them behind Him.  He would keep them in front of Him or beside Him.  He throws them behind His back to not only put them where they belong, but to also restore us to the position where we belong.   He is able to hold us and look into our eyes because our sin isn't in front of Him, and He is able to walk with and guide us because our sin isn't beside Him.

So cast your cares and sin upon Him, and He will cast them behind Him so you can move on, powerful at His side and safe in His arms.