I am a Jesus pusher!!! “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). The FOUNDATION for defining this mercy is in the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament). The Hebrew word for mercy is “chesedh,” and is untranslatable. There is an aspect of the word that means to sympathize with a person in the popular sense of the term. Another aspect is to feel sorry for someone in trouble. But the heart of the word “chesedh” points to the ability to get inside the other person’s skin, able to see things with their eyes, think things with their mind, and feel things with their feelings.
“Chesedh” parallels the concept of sympathy. Sympathy does not come from outside a person, but is motivated from within. For instance, and if children, then heirs — heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him (sympathy), that we may also be glorified together (Romans 8:17). “Sumpascho” (suffer with Him) is two Greek words combined. “Sum” means “together with,” and “pascho” means “to experience or to suffer.” Paul is speaking of the actual suffering in the believer’s life and not an emotional concern over Christ’s suffering. Is it not obvious that a merciful person experiences more than an emotional wave of pity for another person. Something happens within the person not given or acquired from outside, because it comes from his nature, his oneness with Jesus. There is identification with the person who is suffering. A merciful person sees things as the suffering person sees, feeling as they feel. Sympathy means, “experiencing things together with the other person, going through what they go through. Jesus is doing this with me and wants to do it through me for others. I am a Jesus pusher!!!