Fearfully and Wonderfully Made

Psalm 139:13-18

13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
16 your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.
17 How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!
18 Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you.

I have friends whose oldest boy was born without one of his hands. His arm is near the full length of the other one, but his hand is not there. While for others who do not know him it may be a surprise to see him when first meeting him, it has become to me, part of who he is. I really don’t notice it usually. He is so much more than the absence of his hand. It also helps that he isn’t still for more than five seconds at a time.

From the time he was very young he has been fitted with prosthesis to get him use to it. As he ages the complexity of the hand will improve. It is thought it may be so intricate as to play the piano some day. It is truly amazing what science can afford each new generation.

On Sunday I had the privilege of filling in for the three, four and five class. He was in the class. Our lesson was on how God created us, each one differently, each in His image, and each he knew since before we were born. We spoke on how some are tall, some are short, some have dark skin, some have light skin, but each loved equally by God and no one person ought to think himself more important than he is.

Our craft was to measure each child’s height, arm length, leg length, head circumference, and then each child would trace their hand and draw a self portrait in the designated rectangle.

When I got to this child, I measured the arm with the hand and wrote down the length. I moved on to his leg. He said, “Hey, what about this one? This one is different.” So, I said, “Okay, we can measure that one.” I finished measuring and once I was finished with all the other kids, I helped them trace their hands. I got to him again and traced his hand. And he said, “I want to trace this hand too, so everyone knows it’s me.” I said, “Okay, we can do that!”

As I began to trace his little nubby as they call it, I couldn’t help but be so excited that he was celebrating what many people would lament. I drew from around where his arm began to taper to the end and brought it up around the other side. As he lifted his arm off the paper I saw one perfectly formed hand next to an oddly misshapen nubby. As I looked at the paper I saw a thing of beauty, and though a hand was missing, it was complete and as it should be. It is my favorite craft I’ve been involved with to date.

“Suffer the little children to come unto Me.”, Jesus said. I’m so thankful for it, because kids have a way of rebuking adults of which they are blissfully unaware. There are many things I wish I could change about myself. I wish I were shorter, didn’t have the bone structure of my German heritage, could actually grow finger nails, and there are other things as well. But I cannot change my genetic makeup. And I shouldn’t want to. And when I see someone with something that has the potential of limiting him much more than any of my issues, I am reminded that I am ungrateful. And I realize I have forgotten that I am fearfully and wonderfully made.