by Lon Woodrum
PRAY ING HANDS
Have a look at your hands, the poet demands. Hitler had hands; and when he lifted them “ hails” rang in the mighty crowds; hate thundered through the skies, the gray-green legions withered the world. Marx had hands and he wrote his gospel of hate for com munism. Jesus had hands, too; and when He put them forth lepers were healed and the lame leaped for joy. Those hands made a bene diction over the adulterous woman about to fall under the stones. They smoothed the rumpled hair of out cast needy children; they fed the ragged, hungry crowds. Even on a cross they were lifted and flung wide as if to bless the wretched world that was murdering Him. Hands are busy things. And they bless or curse the earth. And the prophet of God warns that the hands which curse life should not be lifted in prayer — unless it be a prayer for cleansing. Oh, be as sured God will not leave a man hopeless, even when his fingers are guilty. He will make a way from our ruin. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as the snow. How true is the trumpet that sounds in Isaiah! The true prophet will note the guilty hands, he will denounce wickedness. But he will hold out hope for the owner of even such hands. No man is God’s prophet who only cries against sin; he must also announce forgiveness and hope. A man may, like guilty David of old, cry: “ I have washed my hands in innocency.” David’s hands had not been without fault. They had done sin. But the very thunders of judgment, he knew, may hide a river of grace. David might well have said, “ I have washed my hands in His forgiveness!” To wo r s h i p is comparatively easy. But to rightly perform it one needs to look at his hands before he bends his knees. END.
before he prays there is another thing that must be considered. “Have a look at your hands,” says the prophet. “What is on them? Blood? Are they innocent hands or guilty?” The heart of a man alone can reply. In our time when we have, as a great Scotch minister calls it “ culti vated a vast inoffensiveness in the ministry,” the language of Isaiah may sound somewhat blunt. But Isaiah wasn’t a “ nice” prophet with a smooth tongue. He was a dedi cated messenger of the Almighty. He knew it didn’t matter to the Lord so much just how a man’s hands were folded when he prayed or if they were freshly washed in water. It is a very simple thing to fold the hands in prayer; but a thief can fold his hands correctly, or a sadist, or a murderer. The hands that can be raised to heaven in an attitude of prayer may also write lies, sign papers to drive a child into the streets, slap a cripple or choke a fellowman. Hands may be very deceptive things. The prophet is clear on one point. Certainly God will have a look at our hands, even if we will not examine them. Beyond all our pious gestures He looks to the mo tives behind them. “Wash you, make you clean . . . cease to do evil . . . learn to do well.” There leaps the order, straight to the soul in prayer. And long after Isaiah there was One who warned against scrub bing the outside of the cup and leav ing filth inside it. He was also the One who said that if we bring our gifts to the altar and there remem ber that our brothers have some thing against us to first effect a reconciliation with them, then put the gift on the altar. Don’t blow a trumpet on the street comer when you pray, He said, or look as if you had received bad news when you fast. Prayer is not just an act; it is the business of a sincere heart.
■ ouch the tips of your fingers to gether and raise your hands j— you have made one of the oldest gestures in the world. The act suggests an old urgency in man. It has come to us out of timeless history. From a primitive period man has passed this gesture through long genera tions. Among many things it signi fies submission, supplication and dependence. Man is a symbolist by nature and by necessity. He expresses him self by countless signs and actions. And by the simple means of lifting folded hands toward heaven he portrays his need to worship God. In a symphonic poem by Isaiah, this gesture of lifted hands is thrust upon our attention with powerful emphasis. “When you spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.” God, in this poem, is not speak ing to pagans who by-pass the house of worship. For obviously these peo ple to whom God speaks were not slack in temple attendance. Their religious activities are clearly pro nounced. There was “ a mutlitude of sacrifices,” an abundance of sab baths and assemblies. But the Voice is stem regarding all this: “ They are a trouble unto me, I am weary to bear them.” Worship is indeed an old thing. The world has ever been full of gods and priests and temples. Wor ship is also comparatively easy — at least the form of it is easy. It takes no great effort to make an oblation or to send up an incense. It is not very difficult to establish moon-days and sabbath-times, to set up assemblies and solemn meet ings and appointed feasts. But, says the poet, this is not the end of the matter. One may go to the right place of worship, and on the right day; he may assume a cor rect posture when he prays. But
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