Clasped Hands

‘For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee’, Isa. 41. 13.

There is always something touching about seeing humans holding hands. Whether it is a wife at the bedside holding onto her husband’s hand in the last stages of life, a father holding onto the hand of his young child, or a newly married couple holding hands having taken their wedding vows; all these examples evoke emotion. This verse is saying, however, that our Majestic God holds our hand. He then whispers ‘Fear not; I will help you’. This beautiful image of our hand clasped in the hand of God emphasizes the tenderness and confidence we gain from His hands. The blind man in Mark chapter 8 would have had many people take him by the hand, and at times no doubt he would lack confidence and stumble, but on one occasion he felt the hand of God. It was Christ Himself that took him by the hand and walked him out of the town. We feel sure he never stumbled that day! He would never have experienced such confidence. Are we not all able to think of moments when we have experienced the very hand of Christ clasped in our own? Like the blind man, we often do not know where we are going but we do know that He is with us and cares for us.

[Extracted from Present Truth magazine, Volume 16, Number 185, August 2011]