Engraven On God’s Hands

ENGRAVEN ON GOD’S HANDS

Isa 49:16

INTRODUCTION

A. HUMOR:

1. A man from New York came to Texas and bought a ranch. After 3 months, his best friend came to Texas to see his ranch. “So what did you name your ranch?” he asked.

2. “Well, my wife and kids and I all wanted to call it different names” admitted the new cowboy. “We couldn’t agree. We finally settled on the Double R, Lazy L, Triple Horseshoe, Bar-7, Lucky Diamond Ranch.”

3. “Wow!” His friend was impressed. “So where are all the cows?” “None of them survived the branding.”

B. TEXT: “Behold, I have engraven you upon the palms of my hands” Isa 49:16.

C. THESIS

1. This promise was given to all God’s people. God will not cast them away; He could no more forget them than a woman forget her nursing child.

2. This promise belongs to US — whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life, and for whom Jesus shed his blood. Every true believer should say, “This is what the Lord says to ME; He says this to give ME comfort and hope.” What do these words mean?

I. KEY WORDS EXAMINED CLOSELY

A. “BEHOLD” – AN OCCASION OF ASTONISHMENT

“Behold, I have engraven you upon the palms of my hands.”

1. “Behold,” is a word of wonder; it’s intended to excite admiration. It’s like an ancient sign board, indicating an amazing revelation being revealed.

2. It’s astonishing that God would engrave – on His hands – the names of sinners and rebels! No doubt the holy angels were lost in amazement when they heard of it.

3. To which of the angels did God say at any time, “I have engraven you upon the palms of My hands?” But to man, who is only a worm, formed of the dust, God has honored with this privilege!

4. Part of the wonder comes from the unbelief of God’s people. In the preceding verse Zion said, “The Lord has forsaken me, and my God has forgotten me.” God is amazed that they would think He had forgotten them!

5. God answers, “How can I forget you, when I have engraven you upon the palms of My hands?” He keeps his promise a thousand times, and yet the next trial makes us doubt Him. He never wavers, even though we are frequently disturbed with fears. What an awesome God we have!

B. “ENGRAVEN” – WHAT HE DID. “Behold, I have engraven you upon the palms of my hands.”

1. WHO IS THE ENGRAVER? The Divine Artist is none other than God Himself. No one can write upon the hand of God except God Himself. What DIDN’T cause Him to write? It wasn’t our merits, prayers, repentance, nor faith that wrote our names there, for our goodness can’t influence God to write upon His hands.

2. WHAT DID CAUSE HIM TO WRITE? It was the Father’s omnipotent love from His heart. If my name is in the Lamb’s Book of Life, God Himself had to place it there! No archangel could possibly have inserted it, only God.

3. GOD’S WRITING IS PERMANENT! Even in the great Egyptian monuments, written in hieroglyphics, there were known to be mistakes. But God makes no errors: MY NAME is written there.

4. There can be no erasures, no crossing out of what God has written. The powers of darkness can’t erase it because GOD put it there! “I have engraven you upon the palms of my hands.”

5. David said, “When I consider your heavens the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have ordained, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you visit him?” (Ps. 8:4)

6. David far underestimated God. Not only is He mindful of us, His feelings run so deep that He couldn’t restrain Himself from engraving us in His hands!

C. THE “WHEN” OF THE ENGRAVING

1. When did He engrave it? In the most distant past: before the Pyramids of Egypt; before primordial man recorded his first records – here is an inscription older than them all.

2. Before the earth was formed, before the sun, moon and stars were hung in their orbits, before there was time itself – our Names were already written down!

3. Jesus is the “Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,” Rev. 13:8. He bears in His hands the marks of His love for us!

4. CONCLUSION? God is no stranger to you. You were known to God from the foundation of the earth; he was always thinking of you; there’s never been a time when you weren’t in his mind and on his heart.

D. “YOU”

1. Someone may say, “Lord, do you mean me?” “Yes, even you, if you by faith cling to My cross.” Notice that He doesn’t say, “Your NAME,” but “I have engraven YOU.”