Okay, let's turn back in our
Bibles again. John chapter 9, I wanted to look
briefly at the hands. No one can pluck them out of
my hand. Verse 29, the Father which gave
them me is greater than all. No man is able to pluck them
out of my Father's hand. isn't it extraordinary the father
can give his precious position into the hands of the son and
they still be in his hand there's a whole lot that we just
believe and love to believe but I don't have to trouble my tiny
brain about trying to understand. I'll just believe it. I'll believe
it passionately. As we're singing that song, it
has echoes of Romans 8, one of those extraordinary verses. Paul,
in a sense, is challenging the world, isn't it? who can be against us? He that
spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall
he not with him also freely give us all things? Who shall lay
anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It
is Christ that died, yea, rather than is risen again, who is even
at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for
us. Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress,
or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword,
as it is written, for thy sake we are killed all day long. We
are accounted as sheep for the slaughters. Nay, in all these
things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For
I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities,
nor power, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height,
nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us
from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus. The Lord Jesus says that he and
the Father are one. There is a glorious union between
the Lord Jesus Christ and his Father, and it's reflected and
reflective of the union between the Lord Jesus Christ and his
people, which is why you can say we're in his hands. We're
in his hands. We are bone of His bone and flesh
of His flesh. He is the head and we are the
body. He is the vine, we are the branches. He is the shepherd
and we are the sheep. In every way we are in His hands
and we are united to Him. I wanted us to spend a few minutes
thinking about these hands. The psalmist in Psalm 35 says,
My times are in thy hand. my times, all of them, my times
right now, my times next week, my times last week, my times
when I leave here, my times are in thy hand. Don't you love that, brothers
and sisters? Everything about our existence
here is in the hands of our great and glorious God. So these hands,
I want us to look at several things about these hands. These
hands are sovereign hands. These hands are nail-pierced
hands. These hands are healing hands.
These hands are saving hands. So these are sovereign hands,
aren't we? We each pass through changing
times. We pass through circumstances
which just cause us to be wondering be serving God's good and glorious
purposes, and yet it does. He changes not. He changes not. And what a glorious grace it
is that we are called upon to trust Him at all times, ye people. Pour out your heart before Him. God is a refuge for us, Psalm
68 too. You pour out your heart before
him. We pour out our heart before
him, not only when the sun shines, but when we pass through the
valley of darkness. He performeth, I want us to think
about these sovereign hands. He performeth the thing He performeth
the thing appointed for me and many such things are with him. All things are
in his hand and under his control. That's why the Lord Jesus can
say, no man can pluck them out of my father's hand. No man can
pluck them out of my hand. No man can pluck them out of
my father's hand. What an extraordinary security
to be in his hands. Everything that moves in this
world, even the most extraordinary inanimate objects, he moves the
clouds according to his will, doesn't he? the clouds turn around
by his counsel. and they do whatsoever he commanded
them. My times are in thy hand, and
that's why we can rest. We can rest if that hand is a
hand that has taken hold of us, if that hand is a hand that's
revealed by a voice that's called us, and that hand is a hand that's
powerfully led us. to the feet of the shepherd,
we'll see that the good shepherd, the good shepherd will cause
his people to rest. Don't you love what he, what
the song of the, Shulamite, the church says in Song of Solomon,
chapter one, she says, tell me, tell me, O thou whom my soul
loveth. See, you can't worship a God
who's not absolutely sovereign, and you can't love a God who
changes and is not absolutely sovereign. Tell me, O thou whom
my soul loveth, where thou feedest, where thou makest thy flock to
rest at noon. Everything is in his hands. My
times are in thy hand. And we can rest in the Lord and
wait patiently for him. We are traveling through this
world to an unknown future and all sorts of things come along
to upset our little trolley, doesn't it? And the wheels fall
off and we get bogged. We're traveling in an unknown
way, but we're traveling with the Known One, aren't we? Everything
is known to Him. Everything is ordained of Him.
It's all been done. All the works are finished from
the foundation of the world. He comes to His own and He calls
it the Time of Love. We can rejoice in these sovereign
hands. No one can pluck any of the sheep
of God out of these hands. My times are in thy hand. And of course, these hands, the
hands of the Lord Jesus Christ, are nail-pierced hands. And when you get to leave this
world and see him, the marks of the nails are still there
in his hands. Forever there are the emblems
in the very body of the Lord Jesus Christ of his glorious
redemption, his glorious victory and his death on Calvary's tree. I love how the Lord, bearing
the sins of all of his people and suffering under the wrath
of God, calls out, my God, my God, why did you forsake me?
As those hands were pierced and blood poured forth from his feet
and from the wounds of his head and his back that was ploughed,
he says, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? What were
his last words on the cross? Now that redemption is finished,
now that all the sins of all of God's elect people, now all
those sheep for whom he laid down his life are free from sin,
they're justified in the presence of God. They are sheep who have
no sin in the presence of God. He then says, Father, Don't you
love that? All through his life he says,
Father, Father, Father, my Father, my Father, my Father. On the
cross he calls out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? But now the work of redemption
is finished. My God, my God becomes Father
again. Now don't you love those first
words to the church? He says, Mary, why are you weeping? If you are a child of God in
this world, what a great question. Why are you weeping? Why are
you weeping? And then he says to Mary, I'm
going to my father and your father, my God and your God. He trusted his father. He came with a purpose, our great
and sovereign God. He came to save his people from
their sins and save them all he did. And he trusted his father,
he was faithful. And his work of obedience to
the law is our work of obedience to the law. His work of faithfulness
to his father even under death is our faithfulness, isn't it?
The life I now live in the flesh, I live by the faithfulness of
the Son of God, who loved me. I was in his hands, he loved
me and he gave himself for me. And the robe of righteousness
is the robe of righteousness that he has spun all by himself. And it's got nothing to do with
me, it's just put on me. Don't you love that picture at
the cross when the men came to divide all of his garments? How
did you get the robe, the seamless robe? You got it by lot. to whom he will give it. And
so it is with the robe of righteousness in these days. This robe of righteousness
bears the weight of life unto death. It bears the weight of
life through all this world and into the next, doesn't it? Father,
into thy hands I commend my that it cannot redeem? Is he
unable to do what he's promised? What hinders God from achieving
his purpose? Why do the wolves and the hirelings
present him as someone who tries and fails? What a ridiculous
and shocking thing to say about God Almighty. As if somehow when
he created the universe there were a bunch of stars that said,
I'm not going to be created. The sheep hear his voice and
they follow him. They're hands of power, but hands
of wisdom. You would have charted a path
through this world and God decided and God in wisdom drew us to
himself and everything he does is wise and everything he does
is right. Because their hands, these powerful hands, are hands
of love and their hands of correction, how often we need a hand of correction
from our God and their hands of guidance, their hands of protection. When my kids were little and
they were in their father's hands and in their father's arms, they
were safe and secure. It didn't matter what the world
was doing to them. We're in His hands, aren't we? We're in these
sovereign hands. These nail-pierced hands are
hands of preservation and they're hands of salvation. They're hands that lead us into
His arms. Even there shall my hand lead
me, and thy right hand shall hold me, Psalm 139, every step
on the way to glory. But listen to this word from
our great and glorious Saviour. Behold, take note, you have a
look at this. Behold, I have graven thee upon
the palms of my hand. before me. Salvation appoints
walls and bulwarks. It's all the description, isn't
it, of our great and glorious God. I'm graven thee on the palms
of my hand. No matter what the circumstances
are, I do love when David had sinned grievously at the end
of his life and he had no reason whatsoever to number the children
of Israel and to count all of his soldiers. They warned him,
they said, you don't need to do it, you've got God on your
side, you've had him on your side, you don't need, doesn't
matter whether you have one troop or none or a million, it makes
absolutely no difference, you have God. And he was given a
choice. The prophet came along and gave
David a choice. And I love what David said. Let me now fall into the hand
of the Lord. I'm going, there's punishment
coming. 70,000 people of Israel died
until the plague was stopped. Until the plague was stopped
at the threshing floor, the place of sacrifice, the plague was
stopped. Let me now fall into the hand
of the Lord, and this is what David said, for very great are
his mercies. Let me fall into his hands. And
just briefly, these hands are sovereign hands, these hands
are nail-pierced hands, these hands are hands of protection
and leading and guidance and preservation, but they're healing
hands, aren't they? They're healing hands. He reached forth his hand and
touched the leper. He touched the leper. That leper
hadn't been touched by anyone. Everyone that saw him ran from
him. How long since he'd had a touch from anyone? And what
happens if you touch a leper? You are immediately defiled unless,
unless all of the leprosy is gone. How can the Lord Jesus
Christ touch us? Because all the sins are gone,
brothers and sisters. A holy God can come and dwell
with his people because they have no sin. Leprosy is a picture
of sin. Where did it go? You just read
Isaiah chapter 53. These healing hands are heels
of substitution and satisfaction and sacrifice. The Sovereign
Saviour successfully saved all of his sheep. He is God our Saviour. These healing hands. He comes to his own. Isaiah 40
says he comes to his own and he picks them up in his arms
and his hands hold them and he carries them close to his heart
and he carries them above all of the things of this world and
he carries them into glory. And they're saving hands for
his sheep, aren't they, don't you love? It's one of the best
prayers in all the Bible. Lord save me. I don't know how often you pray
that. I pray it on a daily basis and
sometimes many times a day. Lord save me. I can't save myself. All I ever do is get myself into
more and more trouble. Lord save me. That was the cry
of a drowning, sinking Peter. And what did he do? I love what
it says, immediately. Immediately. The Lord stretched
forth his hand and caught him and said unto him, O thou of
little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt? What a great word
from our Saviour. Lord save me. And he reached
forth his hand Into thy hands, into thy hands
I commend and commit my spirit. Into thy hands I would commit
my ways, write on my heart thine orders for the day. I would place
all that I may think or plan or say into thy hands. Into thy hands I would commit
my care, all that has troubled me, for thou dost share. So I with confidence would leave
it there in thy kind hands. Into thy hands I would commit
my sin, thou knowest all my faults without within. Thou hast died
my full release to win with pierced hands. Into thy hands I would
commit each friend, be with dawning to its end. Daily may grace and
peace on them descend from thy blessed hands. Into thy hands
I would commit the whole, all needs of body, spirit and soul. So I can rest, leaving the full
control in thy Let's pray. Heavenly Father,
we do thank and praise you for the glories of who you are as
revealed in the wonders of your Son coming and walking this earth. Your Son living here touched
with the feelings of our infirmities, Heavenly Father. He knows our
frame. He knows that we are but dust. But oh, Heavenly Father, what
a wonder it is to hear the shepherd's voice. us back to Him, it calls us to
see Him as He's revealed in this Word, to see Him as an absolute
Sovereign, God Almighty sitting on the throne of this universe,
to see Him, Heavenly Father, taking that Book, that Book of
Life, the Book of the Eternal Covenant of Grace in His blood
and taking that Book and reigning and ruling over all things for
us. Our Father, help us to rest. Help us, our Father, to see him
as precious. Help us, our Father, to sing
the songs of heaven that you have redeemed out of everything in this world. We praise you, Heavenly Father,
for the glory, the glory of complete salvation that's been done for
us and is revealed to us and in us in your dear and precious
Son. Bless your words to our hearts
and may it be the voice of the Good Shepherd, the Great Shepherd