Devotion 298 - hands

She sat quietly; I was sure she was asleep.

We had traveled far and now laid under a beautiful down comforter.  The nightlight next to the bed was still lit.  Ava and I had read a long story.  I shut my eyes hoping she would do the same. 

I heard gentle footsteps in the room.  Thinking we were asleep, my precious sister-in-law had quietly slipped in our room to turn out the lights.  I decided then that everyone should have someone just to tuck them in at night.  I was a girl again.

The bedroom door was shut and I rolled over.  Even in the darkness I could see Ava’s eyes sparkle.  She was silent no more.

With panic in her voice she said, “I can’t see my hands!”

New places, new things, it takes Ava a moment, sometimes more.  She gets that from me.  I quickly grabbed her hands that flailed in the blackness.  I reminded her I was there.  She grabbed my finger, then another, “Hold my hand,” she insisted and we settled into the rhythm of the moonlight in the room.  I watched as her body relaxed.  My hand, so simple and yet so profoundly comforting.

My mind raced.  In just two short days we had seen our beautiful niece marry.  




We had also met five foster children that now live with my husband’s sweet parents.  It was a study in contrast. 

My niece and her fiancé made a gorgeous couple.  

I watched through teary eyes as they dedicated their lives to each other and to God.  I envied their strong faith at such a young age.  You could sense the Father’s presence.  You could feel His hands firmly grasped onto theirs.  The strength of their love clearly fortified through His love.  I was oblivious to those about me awash in prayer and the emotion of the day.  

My daughters were captivated by the beauty and fantasy of it all.  Their new friend, one of the foster children, sat pressed against my side.  She wore a bracelet I had slipped off my wrist onto hers.  It sparkled in the dimly lit church;  I noticed how it reflected the light in her eyes.  I hadn't noticed until just that very moment how beautiful this young six-year old girl was.  I drank her in thinking how badly I wanted to make her life beautiful, how badly I wanted her to have a happy ending. 

For a time she is living away from her parents.  She is old enough to understand she is not at her home but fortunately not wise enough to understand why.  

An innocence remains and two empty hands.

She seems so self-sufficient, so independent.  She can dress herself and pour cereal and make sandwiches all by herself.  But I sat and wondered who holds her hands when the lights dim and the future darkens with the unknown?

I sat in church with her again the next morning.  Her body again was pressed up to mine.   I saw joy ripple through her as she drew pictures, as she sang songs and as she danced in children’s church.  Hands that I had seen as empty now seemed embraced with the presence of Jesus.

I so long to comfort my children;  to keep them from pain, loneliness and from suffering.  I take their hands, shelter their minds, embrace their hearts, but is it enough?  I will not always be there.

Do I point them to the One that is enough and the One that is always there?

Sadness, loneliness, suffering, the absence of right;  mothers abandoning daughters and fathers hurting their sons. 

The Word promises us He brings glory out of ashes but we fight to never be burned.  Then we see it,  a person, a problem that seems hopeless;  and yet, we smell the unmistakable aroma of hope.

It is faint at first, a hand slipping into ours when we cannot see and dare not trust but then faith comes.

The road on which we were sure we could not walk, now we march.  The strength is foreign, the confidence unknown, the warmth odd, yet welcome.  It is HIM.

We cannot describe it in words, but it has a language in the darkness and comfort in the shadows.

Empty hands wait Beloved to be filled with Holy.

For I hold you by your right hand—
    I, the Lord your God.
And I say to you,
    ‘Don’t be afraid. I am here to help you.

Isaiah 41:13-14