Savannah courier. (Savannah, Tenn.) 1885-1979, 1900-03-09

down, or dlsarmed it. Every day thank
God for your right hand. and II you
want to hear its eulogy ask him who
in swift revolution of machinery has
had it crushed, or at Chapultepec or
South mountain OF San Juan hill or
Sedan lost it.
And in passing let me say that be
who has the weapon of the hand un-
injured and in full use needs no other.
You towards who walk with sword
cane or carry pistol in your hip
pocket had better lay aside your dead
ly weapon. AT the frontier, or in bar
barous lands, or as an officer of the
law about TO make arrest. such
arming may be necessary, but no citi-
zen moving in these civilized regions
needs such reinforcement. II you are
afraid to 60 down these streets or
along these country roads without
dagger or firearms, better ask your
grandmother to go with you armed
with scissors and knitting needle.
What towards, if not intended MUIR
derers, uselessly to carry weapons of
death! In our two hands God gave us
all the weapons we need to carry
Again, the hand is the chief exec
utive officer of the soul for affording
hclp. Just see how that hand IS con-
structed. How easily you can lower
1t to raise the fallen. How easily 1t
is extended 10 feel the invald's pulse,
CT gently wipe away the tear of or
phanage, or contribute aims, or
smooth the excited brow, or becllon
into safety. o the helping hands
There are hundreds of thousands Of
Them. and the world wants at least
,600,000,000 of them. Hands to bless
others, hands TO rescue Others, hands
TO save others. What are all these
schools and churches and asylums OF
,ncrct? 0utstretched hands. What
are all those hands distributing tracts
and carrying medicines and trying to
cure blind eyes and deaf ears and
broken bones and disordered intel
lects and hayward sons? Helping
hands. Let each one of us add two
to that number if we have two, or, If
through casualty only one. add that
one. If these hands which we have
so long kept thrust into pockets
through Incidence or folded in indif-
ference or employed in writing wrong
things or doing mean things or hea'-
ing up obstacles in the way of right
eous progress might from this hour
be consecrated to helping others out
and up and on, they would be hands
worth being raised on the resurrec-
ton morn and worth clapping in eter-
nal gl6dness over a world redeemed.
The great artists of the ages
Raphael and Leonardo da Vinci and
Quentin Matsys and Rembrandt and
Albert Durer and Titan - have done
their best picturing the face Of Christ,
but none except AIRY Scheffer seems to
have put much stress upon the hand Of
Christ. Indeed, the mercy of that hand,
the gentleness of that hand, is beyond
all artistic portrayal. Some OF His mir
acles He performed by word of mouth
and without touching the subject be-
fore Him, but most of them He per-
formed through the hand. Was the
dead damsel to be raised to life? "He
took her by the hand" Was the blind
man to have optic nerve restored? HE
took him by the hand" Was the demon
to be exercised from a suffering man ?
"He took him by the hand" The peo-
pie saw this and besought Him to put
His hand on their afflicted ones.
His own hands free, see how the
Lord sympathized with the man who
had lost the use of his hand. 1t was a
case of atrophy, wasting away until
the arm and hand had been reduced in
size beyond any medical or surgical
restoration. Moreover, it was his right
hand, the more important of the two
for the left side in all its parts is weak
err than the right side, and we involun.
tarily, in any exigency, put out the
right hand because we know it is the
best hand. So that poor man had lost
more than half Of his physical arma.
ment. 1t would not have been so bad il
it had been the left hand. But Christ
looked at the shriveed up right hand
dangling uselessly at the mans side
and then cried out with voice that had
omnipotence in it: stretch forth thy
right hand!" and the record is "ht
stretched it forth whole as the other
The blood rushed through the shrunk
en- veins, and the shortened muscles
heightened, and the dead nerves
thrilled, and the lifeless fingers tinglet
with resumed circulation, and the re
stored man held up in the presence oil
the skeptical Pharisee one of Jebovah's
Masterpieces perfect hand. No won
der that story is put three times in the
Bible, so that if sailor were cast away
on barren island, or soldiers New
Testament got mutilated in battle ant
whole pages are destroyed, the ship
wrecked or wounded man in hospta
would probably have at least one o.
those three radiant stories of wha
Christ thought of the human hand.
A pastor in his sermon told how {
little child appreciated the value OF
his hand when he was told that OF
The morrow il must be amputated in or
der TO save his life. Hearing that, h,
went to a quiet place and prayed tina
God would spare his hand. The sur
geon, coming the next day TO do hi
work, found the hand SO much bette
that amputation was postponed, ant
the hand got well. The pastor, tellin,
Of this in a sermon, concluded by hold
ing up his hand and saying; THAT i
the very hand that was spared in an
swer to prayer, and ! hold il up, mon
ument of Divine mercy"
Again, the hand is the chief execu
tive officer of the soul when wrung il
az ony. Tears of relief are sometime
denied IN trouhIe The pyplids nj sI,cI