Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada, the one who loves to sing hymns. And today I want to sing for you a beautiful hymn, an old one called “Jesus, I am Resting, Resting”. It comes straight out of Psalms 63, verse 8 where the Psalmist says: Oh, God, let your hand rest on the man at your right hand.” What a beautiful picture. God is not only putting His hand on you, He is resting His hand on you and it feels and looks like this:
Thou hast bid me gaze upon Thee, And Thy beauty fills my soul,
For by Thy transforming power, Thou hast made me whole.
Jesus, I am resting, resting
Resting in the joy of what thou art.
I am finding out the greatness of thy loving heart.
His hand rests on you. That’s pretty amazing when you think of all the other things God does with His hands: He holds back the rain, He curbs satanic schemes, causes the sun to rise and set — all with His hands. He directs the paths of his people, His hands open doors of opportunity for His children and with his hand He blesses us. With His hands He has carved out rivers, puckered up mountain ranges, ladled out seas, dug the channels for streams and springs — all kinds of things, not to mention those same hands spread wide on the cross at Calvary. And just to think all that and his hand rests on us.
Well, since this week I have been sharing my favorite poems, I have one here that speaks so beautifully of all that God’s hands have done. “The Hands that shaped the flaming spheres and set them spinning, vast light years away from Planet Earth, have laid aside the Robes of State, donned human likeness by the great indignity of birth. The Hands, responsive to Love's Plan, that formed the God-reflector, Man, of dust and destiny, outstretched-by Man's fierce hate impaled — wrought life anew; Love's Plan unveiled upon Golgotha's Tree. The Hands that found it nothing strange to pucker up a mountain range or ladle out a sea, hands that balance Nature's systems still, and shape all History to His will, are holding, they are molding, me!” Wow!
This is a poem I have quoted in at least two of my books and all these many years later, it is still a favorite. If you like it, you can download it by going to my radio page today at joniandfriends.org. Again, that’s joniandfriends.org.
Finally, right now, this moment, remember that the hand of God rests on you; and you are resting in Him. There you are at His right hand and that hand is upon you with God’s rest. Elsewhere in Psalms, it says that the hand of God guides you; and in another Psalm, God's hand protects you, and then again, you are being upheld by the righteous right hand of God. That's reason enough to pause to thank and praise Him because today you are resting in that wonderful truth. So, be still and know that He is God as His hand rests today upon you. Rest in Him, would you? Rest!
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