FAILURE TO SEE MATTHEW BECAUSE OF THE PARALYTIC

 Scotomas are failure to see things that are in plain view. For instance, the nuclear test for my heart could not see my heart because there was a cyst in the way. The cyst had always been there, but even I had not noticed it, although it was in front of my heart and became obvious once the machine could not see through it. The cyst was a ‘scotoma.’

The same goes for scripture. I could not see the ‘paralysis’ of Levi because the paralytic man was in front of him. He was the ‘scotoma’ that blocked my view of Matthew (Levi).

Now let’s analyze Matthew with the thoughts of the paralytic man in mind. We shall examine the paralytic to reveal the paralysis of Levi. They were both in invisible ‘chains’ that were alike yet much different as Jesus would soon expose.

When the multitudes saw the paralyzed man stand upright and walk rightly, they “marveled and glorified God” (Mat 9:8). The paralyzed man had been given a new life… a life of walking, indubitably following Jesus. That event seems to be the answer to the saying of Jesus, “Marvel not; you must be born again” (John 3:7).

The paralytic man had indeed been healed outwardly, and suffice it to say, he was healed inside as well! Jesus had made it clear when He questioned the multitudes, which is easier, “To say, ‘Your sins be forgiven you”’ or to say, ‘Arise, and walk?’” Jesus implied that the man had both been healed and his sins forgiven! Indeed the ‘old creature’ who laid straight arose and walked like the ‘new creature’ — an upright and righteous man.

Since Matthew wrote this account, he minimized his significance. He wrote one sentence about himself.

Matthew arose. He too had been sedentary, doing the business of Caesar; he was collecting taxes on contract to the Romans for profit. He was benefitting the Romans and himself at the expense of the Jews and their kin.

Again, it is implied; Matthew was as paralytic as the man before him, not outwardly, but inwardly. Outwardly Matthew was a Jew but inwardly a Roman. He worked harder for gain in this world than a reward in another. Matthew was also ‘paralyzed’ in a sense. He was just sitting there working day in and day out for the sin of usury.

Usury was one of the hundreds of commandments to avoid. God had Moses write a commandment against usury, “Unto a stranger thou may lend upon usury; but unto thy brother you shall not lend upon usury” (Deut 23:20).

That command applied to Matthew. Usury is lending money; to make a living off the misery of others. Matthew was paid royally to collect taxes from among his ‘brothers’ the Jews.

Just like the paralytic, Matthew arose from his mental paralysis, standing upright, and followed Jesus. No wonder Jesus had just question, “Is (it) easier, to say, ‘Your sins be forgiven you;’ or to say, ‘Arise, and walk’”?

For the first man, Jesus said the latter but for Matthew the former. Either way, both men were made new creatures and were born again; not born from their mother’s womb, but engendered from Jesus, the literal meaning of ‘born again’ (Strong 2006).

The change for both was more inside than outwardly, but for both men, it was reflected outwardly. The man was no longer paralyzed, and neither was Matthew any longer in chains to Caesar because he followed Jesus thereafter.

I have attended church for years. Never have I heard commentary such as this. When I sat down, I had already focused on Jesus eating with the publicans and sinners. I was about to gloss over the recruitment of Matthew to follow Jesus.

Then God gave me insight. What is scripture for? “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Tim 3:16). As I read this new scripture, what was my profit? It revealed to me that both the flesh of Matthew and the other man was in chains but with different symptoms, and that Jesus healed them both because before they were as dead, but Jesus made them both alive by His ‘quickening Spirit” (1 Cor 15:45).

The multitude marveled about the paralytic man, but they glossed over Matthew in the same manner that I was about to do again. Marvel not; both men were born again! Even Matthew glossed over his previous depravity as we all are in the manner of doing.

My bet is that you have glossed over the scriptures as well. ‘Scripture’ was in that day, what is now called the ‘Old Testament.’ Without knowing the Law of God from ancient scripture, you would not have understood from Deuteronomy that Matthew had been as dead and that God blessed him, according to the Law. Matthew, although he had been as dead, was made alive by the Presence of God!

The Law came with a curse but obedience to the Law with a blessing; Moses wrote at the inspiration of God: 

Unto a stranger you may lend upon usury; but unto your brother you shall not lend upon usury: that the Lord your God may bless you in all that you set your hand to in the land whither you go to possess it. (Deut 23:20)

 Matthew was in that land for by then it belonged to the Jews. The Jews were his ‘brothers’ there in a genetic sense. Matthew could have taxed the Romans — the ‘strangers’ but instead he was taxing his Jewish ‘brothers.’ His livelihood was from corrupt money, and his Jewish brothers would have despised him for giving to Caesar what did not belong to Caesar. (At one time, a previous Caesar had been gracious enough to not tax Jews for the Romans, according to Josephus, the historian.) Now, even Jews taxed the Jews on behalf of Caesar!

Matthew was a depraved person according to God’s Law — a ‘parasite’ on the bodies of his fellow Hebrews who were joined together by the Abrahamic Covenant and Mosaic Law.

When Matthew arose and walked with Jesus, he was made free of his invisible chains to Rome, money, and Satan.

It was not Matthew who did the walking for he was rooted to the profitability of it all — the love of money. Jesus vicariously removed the unseen chains that had bound him to the tax collector’s chair. Jesus changed the inner man of Matthew. It was not Matthew who removed the ‘paralysis’ of money but Jesus.

The LORD GOD — Jesus — blessed Matthew, according to the blessing of ceasing usury. He shared His blessings with the him — his virtue (dynamos) that made the old man, Levi, walk as the new man, Matthew.

Matthew said nothing about what he had done because Matthew did nothing. It was Jesus who called, even without saying a thing, for Matthew to follow him.

Matthew, before, had answered the call of Satan! “What?” you marvel!

Matthew was a changed man. When he was the ‘publican’ (tax collector), his name was Levi (Luke 5:27). (Matthew had failed to write that about himself, but Luke revealed him.)

The name ‘Levi’ means ‘joiner’ and is related to the Hebrew word ‘lawa’ (Leviathan) (Abarim Publications 2023). The tax collector, before he was reborn, was a follower of the Beast with many heads. He would follow whoever was evil, and as such, may have been constrained with a demon… one of the many ‘heads’ of Leviathan (Psalm 74:14). With that name, he was a follower of Lucifer, but Jesus changed his nature.

The Hebrew form of the name ‘Matthew” means ‘gift of Yah’ or literally ‘given by God’ (ibid). Leviathan provided Levi, but the gift to Levi was a new Image given to him by Jesus (God). Jesus made Levi — the old creature — into a new creature called ‘Matthew.’

In like manner, Jesus made the paralytic who “on his belly he shall go” like the Serpent (Gen 3:14) an upright man with a “coat of skin” (aka Adam) that would walk upright like Adam.

Both Levi and sinful Adam were made new creatures, but so was the paralytic man!

My bet is that you have never analyzed that chapter, nor have you made the connection between Matthew and the man who had been paralyzed. I had not either until the Word revealed it to me!

God removed the scotoma from my eye, according to scripture, (Mat 7:3), “Why behold you the mote that is in your brother's eye, but consider not the beam that is in your own eye? That ‘beam’ is a scotoma — a ‘dokos’ in the Greek is something that is held up from preventing a clear view (i.e. a scotoma).

(picture credit; Christian Platonianism; "Beam in the Eye")