Nail-Scarred Hands

The sun peers down onto my small ridge-top farm from a cloudless, blue sky . . . wrapping the afternoon in a soft blanket of April warmth. In a few weeks, we will need shade and cold glasses of iced tea to sit on our back patio: Tennessee summers are hot, hotter, and hottest. But right now, gentle sunshine coaxes everything and everyone outside . . . out from Kirkhaven’s dark garden soil . . . out from the stone and brick walls of winter’s sabbatical . . . out into the open, rolling hills of a Kirkhaven spring.

Songbirds, each with their unique melody and refrain, chatter happily from the newly leafed branches of oaks, maples, and poplars surrounding Kirkhaven’s hillside meadows.

A nippy breeze, unwilling to completely relinquish winter’s chilly bite, smells fresh and rich as it skips across the eastern garden. Lilac and lavender and rosemary. Rain-washed soil and lime-green vegetable sprouts. Like soothing aromatherapy, it tempts me to slow down, shush my soul, and simply sit awhile.

It is peaceful here.

I glance at the dirt under my fingernails . . . I am not a fan of gardening gloves . . . and my meandering thoughts are suddenly redirected to a vivid mental image: I see hands. Not my hands. Hands of Another.

I see the rough, work-worn hands of a carpenter. Young hands appearing much older than their 33 years. Scarred and calloused from years of shaping crudely sawn lumber into useful, beautiful things.

Hands brave enough to point a bold finger at institutional corruption.
Compassionate enough to touch the sick and broken with tenderness and healing.
Wise enough to show the way to Truth.
Gentle enough to hold the smiling face of a child.

Hands capable of great strength and great artistry and selfless service . . . but possessing no power to stop the lashes of the soldier’s whip.

Hands once bound by cruel ropes of injustice . . . now cut free . . . so they could be nailed to the beam of a crucifix.

Hands raised . . . willingly, in complete surrender . . . accepting the punishment for vile, dark crimes they did not commit.


Why did I think of this right now?
Such strange juxtapositions:
refreshing breezes and hot lashes of a whip . . .
lyrical bird songs and rhythmic hammer blows of spikes into wood . . .
the fresh, new life of spring and the slow, agonizing death of crucifixion . . . why?

Because the sacrifice bought the serenity.
The grace of God on this small ridge-top farm is very costly indeed.

I have quoted this passage from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s book The Cost of Discipleship before. But it is so greatly on my heart that I want to quote it again:

Cheap grace is the deadly enemy of our Church. We are fighting today for costly grace. Cheap grace means grace sold on the market like cheapjacks’ wares. The sacraments, the forgiveness of sin, and the consolations of religion are thrown away at cut prices. Grace is represented as the Church’s inexhaustible treasury, from which she showers blessings with generous hands, without asking questions or fixing limits. Grace without price; grace without cost! The essence of grace, we suppose, is that the account has been paid in advance; and, because it has been paid, everything can be had for nothing. Since the cost was infinite, the possibilities of using and spending it are infinite...

Cheap grace means the justification of sin without the justification of the sinner. Grace alone does everything, they say, and so everything can remain as it was before. “All for sin could not atone.” . . . Well, then, let the Christian live like the rest of the world, let him model himself on the world’s standards in every sphere of life, and not presumptuously aspire to live a different life under grace from his old life under sin.... Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves...

Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field; for the sake of it a man’ will gladly go and sell all that he has. It is the pearl of great price to buy which the merchant will sell all his goods. It is the kingly rule of Christ, for whose sake a man will pluck out the eye which causes him to stumble, it is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows him.

Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ.

It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life.

It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner.

Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: “ye were bought at a price,” and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us. Costly grace is the Incarnation of God...

Grace is costly because it compels a man to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says: “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

This stunningly beautiful Kirkhaven afternoon leaves me awestruck.

The scented breezes . . . the lyrical birdsongs . . . the inspiring vistas . . . and the nail-scarred Hands.

The Lord . . . He is the One that amazes me.
The One who smiles at the dirt under my fingernails.
And bids me to labor with Him for a while.
And knows the cost . . . and promises the treasure is worth it all.

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires

and to live sensibly, righteously and godly

in the present age,

looking for the blessed hope

and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior,

Christ Jesus,

who gave Himself for us

to redeem us from every lawless deed,

and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession,

zealous for good deeds.

These things speak and exhort and reprove with all authority.

Let no one disregard you.

Titus 2:11-15

Happy Resurrection Sunday!!