Daily Wisdom 09-24-2002 Handwriting

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Handwriting

Taking the prescription dutifully to the pharmacist, I marveled once again at the legibility (or lack thereof) of the doctor's handwriting, which held the immediate future of my health in every scribble.I silently hoped that the medical and pharmacy schools had taught their students to write and read hieroglyphics. I certainly could not complain, though, because the check I wrote to pay for the medicine was certainly not much more legible. Still, somehow the handwriting involved with prescribing, decoding and filling exactly the right chemical from millions of other chemicals was potentially more lethal than my check signature. You would think that the doctor would be more careful with those swirls, lines and dots!

There is a true story about slave mothers whose children, slaves as well, were taken from them at an early age to be sold or traded. In the anguish of separation, the mothers would carve in the palms of their own hands the name of each child as a remembrance - every letter carefully inscribed to preserve the memory in daily hope of a possible reunion.

"But Zion said, 'The LORD has forsaken me, my Lord has forgotten me.' [The Lord said], 'Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have graven you on the palms of my hands; your walls are continually before me'." (Isaiah 49:14-16).

God wrote the name of His chosen people on the palms of His hand even though their slavery was a consequence of their own choice to turn away from His providence. Knowing the sufficiency of His redemptive plan for humankind, God was not merely hoping for reunion - He promised a reunion! Jesus, Godís only begotten Son - God incarnate, left heaven, walked the earth as a man, healed the sick, raised the dead, made the unseeing sightful, caused the lame to walk and taught about the Kingdom of God. Subsequently, He suffered rejection from His own people and death on the cruel Roman cross for sins he did not commit - our sins.

Good news followed the tragedy, however, when Jesus was gloriously and powerfully resurrected from the dead to conquer death, hell and the grave. Seated now at the right hand of God, the Father, Jesus ever lives to make intercession (Hebrews 7:25) for those who will put their faith and trust in Him. He is the Way for all humankind to be reunited with God. "If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved" (Romans 10:9). Then your name will be "written in the Lamb's book of life" (Revelation 21:27).

God's handwriting is precise, legible and everlasting, truly holding our future -- immediate and eternal - in every swirl, line and dot!

Contributed by Barbara Nelson Ulrich
Comments/Feedback are welcome.