From before our creation, God has had His hands on us. And ever since, He has used His hands in our lives to hold us, to mold us, to strengthen us, to transform us.   Since the beginning of time, He has used His hands both figuratively and literally to draw us into a closer relationship with Him.  These verses are such a graphic description of His love…

Psalm 139 –

You have searched me, LORD,
and you KNOW me.
² You KNOW WHEN I SIT AND WHEN I RISE;
you PERCEIVE MY THOUGHTS from afar.
³ You DISCERN MY GOING OUT AND MY LYING DOWN;
YOU ARE FAMILIAR WITH ALL MY WAYS.
⁴ Before a word is on my tongue
you, Lord, KNOW IT COMPLETELY.
⁵ You HEM ME IN BEHIND AND BEFORE,
and you LAY YOUR HAND ON ME.
⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain.

⁷ Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I go up to the heavens,YOU ARE THERE;
if I make my bed in the depths, YOU ARE THERE.
⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
¹⁰ even there YOUR HAND WILL GUIDE ME,
YOUR RIGHT HAND WILL HOLD ME FAST.
¹¹ If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
¹² even the DARKNESS WILL NOT BE DARK TO YOU;
the NIGHT WILL SHINE LIKE THE DAY,
for darkness is as light to you.

¹³ For you CREATED MY INMOST BEING;
you KNIT ME TOGETHER in my mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
YOUR WORKS ARE WONDERFUL,
I know that full well.
¹⁵ My frame was NOT HIDDEN FROM YOU
when I WAS MADE IN THE SECRET PLACE,
when I WAS WOVEN TOGETHER in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ YOUR EYES SAW MY UNFORMED BODY;
ALL THE DAYS ORDAINED FOR ME WERE WRITTEN
before one of them came to be.
¹⁷ How precious to me are your thoughts,^[a] God!
How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ Were I to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand—
WHEN I WAKE, I AM STILL WITH YOU.

These are some of my favorite verses.  Such a picture of the intimate, personal, unrelenting love of God for each of us.  There is nothing that can happen that can take us out of His line of vision.  There is no circumstance that creates a blindspot for Him.  There is nothing that can diminish His love for us or His care of us. When I am up, He is there.  When I am down, He remains.  When I am awake and when I am asleep.  When I am near to Him and when I am far. He is there.  He is here. From before conception He had a plan for us.  And HE IS WITH US in every step of that plan.  How incredible is that?  How amazing?  I can’t even fathom the depth of that thought.  I cannot get over those facts.  And I hope I never do…

I love the hands of God.  They have always captured my attention and imagination.  I am thinking of calling my book, HANDled….As in handled and hand-led….not quite sure how to do that yet, but it came to me in the night.  And the description would be something like, “a hand-in-hand journey into intimacy with God”, or something like that.  (My friend Becky came up with something the other day that I would like to include somehow in the book…she said, “Intimacy…it sounds like “In Him I see.”  Yeah, it sure does.  And that is exactly what it is – the closer I get to Jesus, the clearer I see Him.  Thanks, Becky!  I love that!)