Master's hands

Master's hands are strong hands. His hands show the signs of His life, written in scars and blisters, calluses and ragged edges. I studied His hands as they worked through a strip of leather, learning the stories they told, the language they spoke without the need for words.

There had been a man on the ranch with hands that others liked to tease about. His hands were soft, smooth, marred only by the inks he used to keep track of expenses and inventory. Other men chided him about dirtying his hands when there was work to be done. I had never paid much attention to it, but that was the summer that Etta made fun of my hands. My hands are short, stubby, browned from days outdoors. That was the year I had started cooking in earnest and small scars mingled with the burn of the hand on some part of my arms and digits. I had never looked at them before in the light of touchability, and Etta informed me they were lacking.

I have thought my hands still...'lacking'. They are still brown, and they have not gained delicacy or softness in my time here. Blisters betray the work I do, nicks and cuts tell of cooking and sewing, redness scream of laundry, dishes, cleaning and all things requiring water. I have not offered my hands with a flourish of intention, drawing them back before the unsightly bruises and marks could be spotted.

Today I was proud of the battle worn hands of Master. I saw their strength, their vulnerability, their capability. I was proud of them, and in turn, felt my own comfort grow with the hands I offer. I would come to learn more of the hands that I admired over the next days. I came to cherish every bit of personality His hands would offer, knowing the precise edge that would capture my hair or the rough edge that would scratch my skin was a well earned badge of courage and compassion. I would discover...there is such tenderness beneath that hard and coarse covering. The protection of..my Master's hands.