I love the book “Where is God When It Hurts?” by Phil Yancey. In the book the author tells of when Dr. Paul Brand (a noted hand surgeon) spoke to some folks who had Hanson’s Disease -- leprosy. In his talk, Brand focused on the hands of Jesus. The hands of the baby Jesus. The hands of Jesus the child. The rough and callused carpenter’s hands. Next he spoke of the hands of Christ the physician, the healer.
'Then,' continued the good doctor, 'there was His crucified hands. It hurts me to think of a nail being driven through the center of my hand, because I know what goes on there, the tremendous complex of tendons and nerves and blood vessels and muscles. It's impossible to drive a spike through its center without crippling it. The thought of those healing hands being crippled reminds me of what Christ was prepared to endure. In that act He identified Himself with all the deformed and crippled human beings in the world. Not only was He able to endure poverty with the poor, weariness with the tired, but--clawed hands with the crippled.'
The effect on the listening patients, all social outcasts, was electrifying. Jesus...a cripple, with a claw-like hand like theirs?
Yancey concludes the illustration with this point: “Yes, the pains of life hurt, but it helps me to know that the Great Physician Himself, the Wounded Physician, has felt every stab of pain and every sorrow. Of a truth, Jesus didn't ask man how it feels to hurt, to bleed, to die. Rather, He, in love in sacrifice, became the hurting, the bleeding, the dying.”
Hebrews 4:15 tells us, “We have a high priest (Jesus) who can feel it when we are weak and hurting….”
As you make your way through your storm, let me encourage you today to reach out to the healing hands of Jesus. As you do, think of His nail prints. Those scars are meant to remind you, Jesus gets it because Jesus has experienced it. And Jesus experienced it so you can be healed, blessed as well as victorious; so you can make it through it.
The Redeemed Team
'Then,' continued the good doctor, 'there was His crucified hands. It hurts me to think of a nail being driven through the center of my hand, because I know what goes on there, the tremendous complex of tendons and nerves and blood vessels and muscles. It's impossible to drive a spike through its center without crippling it. The thought of those healing hands being crippled reminds me of what Christ was prepared to endure. In that act He identified Himself with all the deformed and crippled human beings in the world. Not only was He able to endure poverty with the poor, weariness with the tired, but--clawed hands with the crippled.'
The effect on the listening patients, all social outcasts, was electrifying. Jesus...a cripple, with a claw-like hand like theirs?
Yancey concludes the illustration with this point: “Yes, the pains of life hurt, but it helps me to know that the Great Physician Himself, the Wounded Physician, has felt every stab of pain and every sorrow. Of a truth, Jesus didn't ask man how it feels to hurt, to bleed, to die. Rather, He, in love in sacrifice, became the hurting, the bleeding, the dying.”
Hebrews 4:15 tells us, “We have a high priest (Jesus) who can feel it when we are weak and hurting….”
As you make your way through your storm, let me encourage you today to reach out to the healing hands of Jesus. As you do, think of His nail prints. Those scars are meant to remind you, Jesus gets it because Jesus has experienced it. And Jesus experienced it so you can be healed, blessed as well as victorious; so you can make it through it.
The Redeemed Team
