Engraved On The Palm Of His Hand

Engraved On The Palm Of His Hand

Zion said, “The LORD has forsaken me, the Lord has forgotten me.”

“Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are ever before me.” –Isaiah 49:14-16 (NIV)

My mom has carried the same dime in her wallet since 1960. Her sister and sister-in-law tried to use that dime to call her from a pay phone the day my sister, Denise, was born. The phone didn’t accept the dime, so they gave it to my mom, and she has kept it in her wallet ever since. Likewise, my dad carries a memento of that important day in his billfold—an old clipping from the Kansas City Star with the headline, “Doctor Delivers a Jinks on Friday the Thirteenth.” Why would my parents keep an old dime and a faded newspaper clipping so close and so constant? Because they are ready reminders of someone they love, someone who is precious to them.

While carrying a memento of someone we love is meaningful, God has gone even further for his children, the objects of his affection. “I have engraved you on the palms of my hands,” he says. It is as if God holds out his open hands to those who wonder if he has deserted and forgotten them, saying, “Take a look. You’ll see something—someone—too precious to me to forget.” And there, if we will look, we will see ourselves.

The word engrave means “to cut into” something. So in a sense, we’ve been cut into God’s flesh. We are engraved into his very person as a permanent reminder of his eternal, unchanging love for us.

Why would God engrave your image onto the palms of his hands? Because he wants to keep you at the center of his attention. He thinks about you all the time. He watches over you. In the palm of his hand is not only your likeness, but your cares and concerns, your weaknesses and wants, your tendencies and traumas. He sees it all and loves you. He cares about what concerns you because he cares for you. You are always before his eyes and on his mind.

Ultimately, it is not the fact that you know God that really matters. What matters is that he knows you and has set his love on you. You are engraved on the palms of his hands—never off of his mind, out of his sight, or away from his loving care.

Loving Lord, I cannot trust my feelings that sometimes tell me I’m forgotten and abandoned by you. I am far too precious to you. Whenever I doubt your love, I need only trace the palms of your hands where I see my own image engraved and the scars from nails that once held you to the cross out of love for me.

DIGGING DEEPER