THE HANDS THAT BORE THE NAILS

Acts 2:23  "This man was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross."

Every time I read in a book, or referenced to in the Bible, of my Savior, Jesus, being nailed to the cross, I find myself doing the same thing.  Doesn't matter where I am, what I am doing at the time, if I hear or read or see in a movie or television program.....of the nails being driven into my Lord's hands.....my fingers reach for the palm on the other hand and feel there, in the middle.  I have to put my hand in the other and feel the smoothness of my palm, where no nail has been driven, no skin broken by misunderstanding, confusion......religion.

 My hands will never know the pain felt that day by my Jesus.  I will never know the sting of my closest friends running in fear.  My brow will never feel the anguish of thorns of a crown crushing in, drawing blood.  My side will never know the rush of the flow of watery blood running down when a spear presses into the flesh.  No, I will never suffer in the manner that the One who loved me so, suffered in my place.

As I feel the palms of my hands, the only thing I feel is the impression of my Lord's hand where He has held mine day after day as I walked toward the goal He set before me.  Sometimes upright, walking boldly.....sometimes, falling, overwhelmed by life....but at all times feeling that hand that holds  mine strongly, never letting go, always lifting, drawing upward, gently but firmly.

I will never know the pain of a thorny crown, because when my Savior wore that crown, He gave me His crown of righteousness, His crown of favor, His crown of mercy and grace.  A crown that would never be a burden, a painful reflection of someone I could only hope to be, but a crown of life extended by the Giver of life, the Restorer of souls.....a crown of love.

Never would I feel my side being pierced, but instead I receive a piercing, strong and determined, into my heart by the Holy Spirit as I am led to the Master's feet, time and again, to receive an outpouring onto me of His anointing, His blessings and unmerited favor.

Those hands that bore the nails, that bore the pain, the shame.........my sin....those hands are the hands that I reach for each morning when I awake, as He waits to lead me through the day.  Those hands, those beautiful hands are the very hands that one day I will kiss as I kneel before my Lord and Savior, Jesus.

Yes, every time I hear, I see, references to the nails that dug deep into my Savior's hands, driving deep to hang Him on a cross to die for my sin.......I know I will reach into the palms of my own hands and remember, as I feel my unblemished palms.....that those nails, but for my God, were meant for me.

02-09-13