Precious Hands

 

In the days before Covid-19 restrictions, when toddler grandchildren could visit us at home, I always smiled when they had left, as I wiped away the tiny handprints they left behind, smudged on glazed doors. There is something precious and unique about our hands.

I have two hand-made Christmas cards sitting on my table at the moment, made by three precious grandchildren. Callan fashioned his handprint into a cheeky robin with a googly eye. Ella and Joel put their handprints together into a beautiful butterfly design. Special.

There is something amazing about hands. With them we can build, we can be creative, inventive, loving, protective, kind.

In Isaiah, God assures us that he holds our hand: ‘Fear not, I am the one who helps you.’ Whatever we face today, he holds our hand and is with us, helping us. He declares that he has engraved us on his hands: the creative, kind, healing hands of our Saviour Jesus pierced and torn for us. Such desecration. Such love.

I thank God today that I have two hands which still function. Two hands with which to cook and clean and garden and sew, type and brush hair and caress loved faces. I thank God for the hands of those three precious little ones, preserved in a moment in time. What wonderful things will they do with their hands in their lifetimes, I wonder?

May we all put our hands to good use today, offering help, doing mundane tasks, creating beauty, having fun. So thankful for the promise of Jesus, that ‘no-one will snatch’ us out of his hand. No one.