I love to hold hands. I am a touchy feelie kind of person...I hug people...a lot. I grasp their shoulder, or stroke their arm or lay my hand on their face when I am talking to them. I hold their hand when I want to tell them something important. I need to touch people...I am not weird okay, it's just about love and not the awkward you're too close to me love...
There is something about the human hand that is so necessary to another person...touch is stimulating. Did you know there are over 17000 nerve endings on the human hand and that in one square centimeter on a finger tip there are 1300 nerve receptors? And they all go straight to the brain....they give us awareness that another person is near.
From the time we are born on the earth we are touched by human hands...the doctor delivers, the parent holds, strokes, tickles...we hold their hand to cross the street, we reach for it when we are nervous or uncertain...it gives strength to hold a hand, security. When we are young we reach for a friend's hand to show affection, to claim our bestie...
In the bloom of love, the first touch is often hand to hand....the hand creeps across the table to stroke the other, it breaks a smile upon their face, fingers twine and hold on. Throughout this most important chosen relationship in our lives, our hands are connectors to the other....in strength, anger, weakness, despair, joy, passion, elation....we communicate so much through the touch of a mere fingertip...I love holding hands with my husband, the swirl of his thumb in my palm or a stroke across my knuckle...it's a casual, familiar thing...and yet not.
When we despair, we grasp on with our hands...to runaway spouse, to a sick child, a dying parent, a memory we don't want to lose...I held my mother's hand as she took her last breaths on this earth...I don't know if she knew, but I did. I needed it.
We have been made with touch in mind...with hands that hold great power, formed by them. He could have spoke us into creation but instead He formed us with His very hands...He wanted to touch us....He still does, He still holds us.
Psalm 119:73 (MSG) With your very own hands you formed me; ... Oh, love me—and right now!—hold me tight! just the way you promised. Now comfort me so I can live, really live;
He is not far away....He reaches out to us daily, even by the moment...wanting desparately to take our hand and lead the way....'I wanna hold your haaaaaaand....I wanna hold your hand', He croons softly to you. And when you answer yes, and grasp on to the stongest most capable Hand ever, then He also holds you in His hands, protected and loved, as well...
No better place to be...
