Carved on the Hands of God

(from Isaiah 49:14-16)

There was a day when God's people felt forgotten.

Far from home. Tired and small.
And they said a sad, sad thing.
They said, "God has left us.
God has forgotten all about us."

Have you ever felt that way?
Like the One who matters most
has looked away,
and let go of your hand,
and walked on without you?

It is a lonely, shivery feeling.
So listen to what God said back.
Listen close.

God said:
"Can a mother forget the baby at her chest?
Can she stop loving the little one she carried,
the one who is part of her very heart?"

A mother does not forget her child.
She knows the weight of you in her arms.
She knows your cry in a roomful of crying.

And God went further still:
"Even if a mother could forget,
even then,
I will not forget you.
I could never, never forget you."

Then God said:
"Look. Look at my hands.
I have carved your name there,
right into my palms.
Carved deep, to stay,
where no rain can wash it
and no years can rub it away."

Imagine that.
Your name,
held in the hands of God,
where he sees it every moment.

Among all the names in all the world,
he can find yours,
cut into his own palms.

Long, long after Isaiah,
God came near with real hands.
Jesus.
Do you remember the servant
who carried everyone's wrong like heavy stones?
His hands were carved too,
not with a gentle knife,
but with the nails of the cross,
the hurt he chose,
for love of you.

And after he rose,
alive again,
he showed his friends those very hands.
"Look," he said. "Look. It is really me."
The marks were still there.
They will always be there.

So when the shivery feeling comes,
when you wonder if you have been forgotten,
you can remember this:

God carved your name
where it would cost him something.
He carved it close,
into the very hands that saved you.

You are remembered.
You are held.
Your name is in his hands,
and his hands are the hands that found you,
reaching out,
even now.