Working Man's Hands
One of the things that makes you unique among all of God's creation is your hand. The design of your hand allows you to do things with your hands that other animals cannot do. The main difference in your hand and other animal's hands are "opposable thumbs". When I was younger they said that only man had opposable thumbs. They have changed the definition today and they list apes, monkeys, opossums, raccoons, and some tree frogs with them. Now most apes and monkeys and other animals have opposable thumbs, but the human hand is unique in the ability of the thumb. Here is what one authority said:
"In the absence of any other proof, the thumb alone would convince me of God's existence." Sir Isaac Newton
Have you ever noticed how many ideas are connected to the hand? If a man is good looking, we call him handsome. People that can work with their hands to fix things are handymen. Someone clever and someone that is needed is considered handy.
How about hand gestures? There are many symbols connected with the hand. Pointing with the index finger is one. So is the thumbs up symbol. The middle finger is used as a cuss word. So is the thumbs down gesture. Have you ever seen a traffic cop using his hands to control traffic? He puts his palm out to signal stop and waves his hand forward to signal proceed. We shake hands to show friendship. We scratch our heads to show perplexity and thinking. We point up to show God and heaven.
Hands are a major part of our anatomy and are very important in the success of the maintenance tech. The ability to use your hands will determine your ability to fix things.
Another observer made the following statements:
"Humans are the only animals on earth with fully opposable thumbs. Primates have good power grips (grasping tree limbs for swinging and rocks for throwing), but lack the level of opposition that would give them a good pincher grip, or fine motor skills. Most primates' thumbs will only oppose to their index fingers, making a two-digit pincher grasp their best hope for peeling that banana. Our thumbs, however, are finely tuned machines. They're longer, more maneuverable, and better controlled than our primate friends' thumbs.
Twenty-five percent of the brain's motor power is devoted to the hand, while a generous four percent of the brain's power is devoted to thumb control.
Human thumbs are capable of moving in six different directions, rocketing that shrimpy digit beyond even the best ape thumb. To explain this zoological difference from an evolutionary point of view, consider a study conducted by scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. It, at least partially, debunks the stigma surrounding "junk DNA," and pinpoints a factor that accounts for human's superiority over other primates. These scientists isolated a human gene enhancer (a switch that hangs out near the genes and influences them), named HACNS1, and determined that despite former ideals that named it "junk," it played an important role in the development of the human thumb. To prove this, the researchers gathered the named gene enhancer from a human, a chimpanzee, and a macaque (named in descending order of thumb opposability), coupled the enhancer with a blue dye gene, and injected each into different female laboratory mice. In the mice's fetuses, a surprising result was discovered. The fetuses who inherited the human gene enhancer showed the strongest active blue dye areas - in the hands (front feet), feet (back feet), and throats. The mouse fetuses that inherited the chimp and macaque enhancers showed blue in the same areas, but without the potency of the fetus subjected to the human enhancer. This means that what was once considered "junk DNA" has now been proven to separate us from other primates, in the areas of speech, fully opposable thumbs, and bipedal travel. Just goes to show - one scientific community's junk is another civilization's reason for advancement."
These quotes are from an article entitled "The Opposable Thumb - Evolution's Gift to Humankind Man's Power Digit Points to Primitive and Positive Rules of Thumb" by Tonya Reiman found on the Website "Body Language University". While this lady refers to evolution as the reason for the uniqueness of the human hand, it clearly shows the design of God in the creation of human beings!
Eventually real science catches up to the Bible! Isn't it amazing that they found the ability to speak, use hands, and walk upright. These are the things God has given to man to make him different and successful in nature! To God be the glory, not evolution!
Just like God designed the hand for a multitude of purposes. God has designed people all the same but different for a purpose. One of the things that makes us similar is our hands. Most of us have four fingers and a thumb. However, all hands, though similar, are unique. Some have longer fingers than others. Everyone has fingerprints and they are all different.
One of the greatest things you will ever learn is God's purpose for your uniqueness. You will never be completely satisfied until you find out why you are here. What is it that God has for you? It is called the perfect will of God! Finding out what God wants you to do in this short life will give you peace and satisfaction. It will also bring happiness!
I have working man's hands. There are scars, and blemishes because of the daily damage I have done to my hands. Sometimes they don't work very well. They lock up on me and I have to pry them apart. I was talking to a young lady the other day. I asked her what she thought the will of God was for her life. She told me that she was working as a CNC machinist for her dad. She then told me that she played the piano and liked teaching others to play the piano. I told her to take care of her hands. The hands of a machinist and the hands of a piano player are different. She could damage her hands to the point where it would affect her piano playing ability. The old electrician that trained me, told me to use tools with cushions on the handles to protect and preserve my hands. Good piano players and guitar players have long fingers. That is what allows them the dexterity to play the notes successfully. For a while I worked in a mission board office. I sat at a computer and typed the missionary's support into their accounts. I noticed after a while that I got real fast at typing "Baptist Church"! Most of the missionary support came from Baptist churches, so I had to type it frequently. My hands learned how to type it without really thinking about it. Also, I have observed piano players that can play without thinking. I have actually seen them carry on a conversation and keep playing and not miss a note!
There is an old thought about the theory of evolution and chance producing this complex world that uses monkeys sitting at typewriters. The theory is that if you had an infinite amount of monkeys sitting at an infinite amount of typewriters for an infinite amount of time they would eventually type one of the works of William Shakespeare. There are many problems with this thinking. The first being that there is not an infinite amount of time, monkeys, or typewriters! The other fallacy is that monkeys can't use their fingers to type. They can hunt and peck, but will never produce anything but random letter formations. Monkeys also have a very important attribute. They get bored and then eventually they die. Also, monkeys have never been taught to type.
The following was taken from a Wikipedia article entitled "Infinite Monkey Theorem": (I removed the foot note references and links to other articles)
"If there were as many monkeys as there are atoms in the observable universe typing extremely fast for trillions of times the life of the universe, the probability of the monkeys replicating even a single page of Shakespeare is unfathomably small.
Ignoring punctuation, spacing, and capitalization, a monkey typing letters uniformly at random has a chance of one in 26 of correctly typing the first letter of Hamlet. It has a chance of one in 676 (26 × 26) of typing the first two letters. Because the probability shrinks exponentially, at 20 letters it already has only a chance of one in 2620= 19,928,148,895,209,409,152,340,197,376 (almost 2 × 1028). In the case of the entire text of Hamlet, the probabilities are so vanishingly small as to be inconceivable. The text of Hamlet contains approximately 130,000 letters. Thus there is a probability of one in 3.4 × 10183,946 to get the text right at the first trial. The average number of letters that needs to be typed until the text appears is also 3.4 × 10183,946, or including punctuation, 4.4 × 10360,783.
Even if every proton in the observable universe were a monkey with a typewriter, typing from the Big Bang until the end of the universe (when protons might no longer exist), they would still need a still far greater amount of time – more than three hundred and sixty thousand orders of magnitude longer – to have even a 1 in 10500chance of success. To put it another way, for a one in a trillion chance of success, there would need to be 10360,641 universes made of atomic monkeys. As Kitteland Kroemer put it in their textbook on thermodynamics, the field whose statistical foundations motivated the first known expositions of typing monkeys, "The probability of Hamlet is therefore zero in any operational sense of an event...", and the statement that the monkeys must eventually succeed "gives a misleading conclusion about very, very large numbers."
In fact there is less than a one in a trillion chance of success that such a universe made of monkeys could type any particular document a mere 79 characters long.
In 2003, lecturers and students from the University of Plymouth MediaLab Arts course used a £2,000 grant from the Arts Council to study the literary output of real monkeys. They left a computer keyboard in the enclosure of six Celebes crested macaques in Paignton Zoo in Devon in England for a month, with a radio link to broadcast the results on a website.
Not only did the monkeys produce nothing but five total pages] largely consisting of the letter "s", the lead male began by bashing the keyboard with a stone, and the monkeys continued by urinating and defecating on it. Mike Phillips, director of the university's Institute of Digital Arts and Technology (i-DAT), said that the artist-funded project was primarily performance art, and they had learned "an awful lot" from it. He concluded that monkeys "are not random generators. They're more complex than that. ... They were quite interested in the screen, and they saw that when they typed a letter, something happened. There was a level of intention there."
The funny thing about this is that evolutionists still think that randomness can produce complexity. The truth is that randomness produces more randomness.
So, man's hands are unique. They are one of the things that makes us in God's image, even fallen man has the fallen image of God. Let's look at hands:
Man's Hands.
The hands of men are mentioned a lot in the Bible. Which makes sense since the hands are what make men unique and useful. Men are known by their head, their heart, and their hands! Someone that submits these three areas to the Lord is on their way to success! The successful, balanced maintenance tech will constantly improve in these areas.
First, men need willing hands. It is important to have willing hands that God can use to bring Him glory!
The popular symbol for prayer is hands clasped together, or a face in the hands.
The Bible gives a different picture of praying hands being outstretched toward heaven.
1 Timothy 2:8 "I will therefore that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting."
Lifting up your hands with your palms outstretched shows many things to God. First it shows that there is nothing in them. This shows the dependence on God to provide. It also shows no weapon to use against God. It also shows that you are not hiding anything. Notice how the word holy is used. Holy means that they are dedicated to God. Also, it is important to notice that wrath and doubting are to be avoided. Empty hands are a symbol of prayer. Empty hands are important to gaining answers to prayers! Empty hands show that you are not holding back anything! What a person gives to God, God will take and use. It is important in praying to submit to God and to be available to God for you to be the answer! Lifted hands are a sign of volunteering. It also shows the submission to God. It says, "Here are my hands. Fill them, use them!"
Raised hands are also a form of worship. Worshipping hands are lifted up as a sign that we need God to grasp our hands and guide us. It is like a child in an unfamiliar place who will seek her father's hand to hold for comfort and safety.
Psalm 134:2 "Lift up your hands in the sanctuary, and bless the LORD."
Psalms 143:6 "I stretch forth my hands unto thee: my soul thirsteth after thee, as a thirsty land. Selah."
In addition, the Bible points to working hands. The hands are for doing work. They are for holding and handling tools. They are for fashioning something useful. They can be used for writing, repairing, adjusting, and repetitive tasks. Notice how labor is spoken of as something healthy to do with your own hands.
I Corinthians 4:12 "And labour, working with our own hands: being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we suffer it:"
A great way to combat reviling and persecution is to just keep on working! Over time the people reviling and persecuting will see the results of your hard work and will appreciate and maybe listen to you!
Proverbs 12:14 "A man shall be satisfied with good by the fruit of his mouth: and the recompence of a man's hands shall be rendered unto him."
The Bible also speaks of warring hands. These are hands that have been trained to battle successfully. As I learned in the Marine Corps, all battle eventually comes down to "hand to hand" combat! Isn't it instructive that it is called "hand to hand" combat? It is fighting, wrestling, and finally killing the enemy with your hands! The modern generation has a repulsion against war. They consider it a sin. Like many modern ideas, this is one that is not Biblical. War, especially, defensive war, is a necessary part of life. The enemy is always there. The enemy is always envious and wants the peace, prosperity, and good life that comes from the blessings of God. Learning how to fight the battle is not only necessary, but essential, as the Christian life is likened to a battle.
War is not good. It has been described as "hell on earth"! Still, like garbage, and sin, it must be prepared for. War is not desired, but many times is necessary. One of the great leadership skills to learn is to be prepared for war. One of the greatest leadership mistakes is the absence of being prepared for war! Use peace and prosperity to prepare for those that want to steal your peace and prosperity! War should be prepared for, but not entered into lightly. One of the Bible admonitions of counsel is to get good advice before going to war.
Proverbs 24:6 "For by wise counsel thou shalt make thy war: and in multitude of counsellors there is safety."
War always comes down to "hand to hand" combat. It is important to teach your hands to use weapons. It takes practice. Everyone should learn how to use a gun, knife, and baseball bat to defend themselves and others, especially your family. A good way to teach your hands to war is to go out in the woods and hunt animals. I realize that modern Christians are against hunting also, but the Bible is for it. Check out Proverbs 12:27:
Proverbs 12:27 "The slothful man roasteth not that which he took in hunting: but the substance of a diligent man is precious."
Notice how hands that are given to God become warring hands:
2 Samuel 22:35 "He teacheth my hands to war; so that a bow of steel is broken by mine arms."
Psalms 18:34 "He teacheth my hands to war, so that a bow of steel is broken by mine arms."
Psalms 144:1,2 "Blessed be the LORD my strength, which teacheth my hands to war, and my fingers to fight:
My goodness, and my fortress; my high tower, and my deliverer; my shield, and he in whom I trust; who subdueth my people under me."
On the spiritual side. It is important to keep in mind that you are in a battle! There is the war with your own flesh. There is a war with the ungodly, evil influence of the world. Teach your hands how to write, pass out tracts, point the way to heaven and you will be successful as a Christian. The Christian life is won with the hands. Hands holding the Bible and reading it. Hands holding a phone and texting or calling someone inviting them to church. Hands lifting up others from the results of their own stupidity and bad decisions.
There is another aspect of hands that stands out for the Proverbs 31 woman. Notice that one of her outstanding features is the use of her hands:
Proverbs 31:13 "She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands."
Proverbs 31:16 "She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard."
Proverbs 31:17 "She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms."
Proverbs 31:19 "She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff."
Proverbs 31:20 "She stretcheth out her hand to the poor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy."
Proverbs 31:31 "Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates."
I tell young girls to work on their personality, because their good looks will not last them their whole life and that beauty is deceptive and wears away when someone learns what their heart is like. I also tell them to give their hands to the Lord and let Him teach them what to do.
A good, godly woman is known by what she does with her hands. Notice these verses in Proverbs:
Proverbs 14:1 "Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands."
The wise woman is using her hands to build her house. She is improving it. Notice how the Bible shows the ownership by using the word "her" house. She is responsible for it. However, the foolish woman is plucking down her house with her hands. Again notice the pronoun of "it"! She is not interested in the value of the house. She is not destroying it in one fell swoop. She just keeps picking at it until it falls and fails!
Also, it is important to see what the wasteful and slothful do with their hands:
Proverbs 6:10, 11 "Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep:
So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man."
Proverbs 21:25 "The desire of the slothful killeth him; for his hands refuse to labour."
The path from wasted hands to wicked hands is slippery and downward. There is something inside of a man or woman which pushes them to use their hands. They can choose to use them to serve God, for their own sinful pleasures, or worse, for the pleasure of the devil. It is extremely important to control your hands. Look at the results of wicked hands:
Acts 2:23 "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:"
Isaiah 3:11 "Woe unto the wicked! It shall be ill with him: for the reward of his hands shall be given him."
One of the greatest images I remember from the Bible is when Pilate, after delivering Jesus to be crucified, washed his hands. In a futile gesture, he was trying to wipe the blood off of them. I can imagine him in hell still trying to clean his hands!
Psalms 144:1,2 "Blessed be the LORD my strength, which teacheth my hands to war, and my fingers to fight:
My goodness, and my fortress; my high tower, and my deliverer; my shield, and he in whom I trust; who subdueth my people under me."
God's Hands.
Through the revelation of the Bible, we understand that God also has hands. Which makes sense that he made man with such amazing attributes as hands! Notice what is revealed about God's hands!
Isaiah 45:12 "I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded."
Psalm 119:73 "Thy hands have made me and fashioned me: give me understanding, that I may learn thy commandments."
This teaches a great thing. God spoke the creation in existence. ("God said…" Genesis 1:3,6,9,11,14,20,24,26)
He then stretched it out with His hands! He also used his hands to "form" Adam.
Genesis 2:7 "And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul."
God not only uses his hands to create and form, He uses them in judgement. This aspect of God is not much admired today. It is however, a vital and important aspect of a Holy God. One of the things that makes God unique is His integrity. When God says something it happens. A "fair" God will keep His word. One of the pictures of God that is brought out in the book of Isaiah is God's outstretched hand of judgement for wickedness and sin!
Isaiah 10:4 "Without me they shall bow down under the prisoners, and they shall fall under the slain. For all this his anger in not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still."
One of the symbols that is still used today is when a person is sworn in, they raise their right hand and put their left hand on the Bible and "Swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."
Every elected official and every person entering the armed service must raise their right hand and take this oath: "I, (name), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God."
The stretched out hand is the symbol of faithfulness to do what is right. It is a solemn oath and very serious in God's eyes.
God also uses His hands to call people to Him.
Romans 10:21 "But to Israel he saith, All day long I have stretched forth my hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people."
One of the greatest warnings in the Bible is in Proverbs 1:24-33
"Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched forth my hand, and no man regarded;
But ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof:
I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh;
When your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you.
Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early but they shall not find me;
For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD: they would none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof.
Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices.
For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of tools shall destroy them.
But whoso hearkeneth unto me shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet from fear of evil."
I find it fascinating that God's outstretched hand signifies not only judgement, but the call to come to Him! I have found that God's judgment is also a call. When God's judgment is pronounced. He watches and sees what we do. When we repent, many times He repents and displays His goodness.
Romans 2:3-6 "And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God?
Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?
But after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God;
Who will render to every man according to his deeds:"
It is when we reject His pronouncements of judgement that the judgement comes with all of its consequences and severity.
Proverbs 29:1 "He, that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy."
God is also spoken of with hands of guidance. This is a great aspect of God that shows His interest in our success. One of my favorite verses in the Psalms is inPsalms 139: 9,10. It shows that God has two hands. A right and a left hand and that He uses both of them to guide and protect his children, even the foolish children.
Psalm 139:9, 10 "If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;
Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me."
Ecclesiastes 11:2 "A wise man's heart is at his right hand; but a fool's heart at his left."
The foolish man must be pointed out the way to go. It is back to God and His holding, leading hand! God uses His left hand to point the way. The foolish must be restrained to keep them from making disastrous mistakes! So too with the wise man. He must be held as He does God's will! Both need God's hands on them to keep them in the right way. Walking with God is holding His hand as He talks and walks with you. The Bible example is Enoch (Genesis 5:22 & 23). The example of the foolish is Lot. Notice how God had to grab him and his family by the hand to get them out of Sodom and Gomorrah! It is interesting to see God sent two angels because there were four of them that needed to be lead out of the city. Four hands, one for each person! That is the mercy of God! It is personal contact and leading.
Genesis 19:16 "And while he lingered, the men laid hold upon his hand, and upon the hand of his wife, and upon the hand of his two daughters; the LORD being merciful unto him: and they brought him forth, and set him without the city."
Jesus' Hands.
When Jesus shows up in the Bible, He shows up with the hands of a man. He is called the son of man. He also has the hands of God because He is God. As a result He has holy hands.
1 Timothy 3:16 "And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory."
Since Jesus has the hands of God, He has helping hands. When Peter was walking on the water by faith and started to sink this is what happened: Matthew 14:31 "And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him , and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?" And he put him back in the boat!
He also has healing hands. Jesus uses his hand to not only help people but to heal them also. Luke 4:40 "Now when the sun was setting, all they that had any sick with divers diseases brought them unto him; and he laid his hands on every one of them, and healed them."
Probably the greatest thing Jesus did with his hands is provide the way to heaven! The way to heaven is through his hands. They put nails in His hands to nail Him to the cross. He willingly laid down His life to redeem you and me.
John 10:17, 18 "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.
No man taketh it from me but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father."
Revelation 3:20 "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him and will sup with him, and he with me."
Jesus hands are the hand of God and as a result He has the same holding hands that God revealed in Psalm 139!
John 10:28, 29 "And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
My Father which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them outh of my Father's hand."
Please take care of your hands and put your hands into His hands and let God save you and keep you as you find the perfect will of God for your life and have success.
