the gracious hand

When images like these ones went viral on the internet a year ago, my bucket-list had some serious adjustments made to it. “Some day I just have to go to this place.”

It did not take long. On our return to South Asia a few weeks ago, I engineered a right hand turn at Singapore and took Barby off to Vietnam for a week’s holiday. This Golden Bridge has become an international phenomenon, with tourists flooding in from all around Asia and, increasingly, the world. It is set atop the Ba Na Hills, a former French hill-station, 40min west of Da Nang and 1500m above sea level.

Why this compulsion to go?

I know the locals speak about these hands belonging to some mystical Being in the forest. Nah, that is not for me. If they can lean on their French colonialist heritage for the naming of the cable car stations and if they can build a European-themed village atop these hills (“Why? I don’t understand why you’d want to celebrate that past in this way”), then they won’t mind if I reach for the French philosophers and the European theologians and do some radical reader-response criticism and make this text, this work of art with these hands, to mean whatever I want it to mean.

For me, these hands represent the hands of the living God of the Bible, the Creator of the universe, the Sovereign over nations, the Lord of history and ‘the God who has been my Shepherd all my life to this day’ (Gen 49.15). In the split second when I first saw images like this on the internet, my imagination went straight to one of my all-time favourite biblical phrases: “the gracious hand of my God was upon me.” 

As far as I can tell, the phrase (and its variants) pops up only in Ezra & Nehemiah. There is something about emerging out of exile, building afresh with God, that makes this phrase so critical. Just as there is something about the activism in Christian life and leadership today – with all our vision and strategy, our goals and outcomes – that needs to be reminded that everything is to be done, explicitly and intentionally, under this gracious hand.

The most celebrated (twin) appearances of this phrase are in Nehemiah 2 (2.8, 18). The gracious hand is the reason behind Nehemiah’s success with his Emperor-employer when he asks to go home, just as it will become the reason for success, just ten verses later, when he engages a despairing people standing among the ruins of their city. But, wait, there is more! This same hand also appears twice, just three verses apart, in Ezra’s return to Jerusalem (7.6; 7.9). Yes, even in the verse immediately before the most celebrated verse in all of Ezra, where he speaks of his way with the Word of God (7.10), it is this gracious hand that makes that way possible. (NB: for other appearances of the hand, see Ezra 7.28; 8.18; 8.22; 8.32).

So, with my 60th birthday around the corner, I desperately wanted to get to this bridge, take some photos, and bear witness to this same gracious hand at work in my life. For many years I never thought I had a testimony. I have no memory of a time when I didn’t love Jesus, in the knowledge that he first loved me. The only darkness-to-light experience I’ve ever had was more akin to the dawning of the day than some strike of lightning that might knock me off my horse. But I do have a testimony. Yes, I do. It is that the gracious hand of God has been on my life, in my whanau and my whakapapa, all these years until now.

With any photos with these hands in these images, I had to play with the prepositions a bit. Any photo would have to be with the gracious hand UNDER me, rather than UPON me, but that proved to be more difficult than I anticipated. I settled for ones with the hand OVER me and BESIDE me – and that will have to be enough. It is just as well that I love prepositions…

[BTW, on my love for prepositions and evidences of the gracious hand of God, in the last few weeks a lesser-known, much-loved book of John Stott’s has been republished by Langham: Focus on Christ. In it Stott explores the theological significance of various prepositions as they are attached to Christ. It is a beautiful book. I remember making a request to have it republished almost ten years ago, but we didn’t have the rights to do so. But the gracious hand has been evident in peoples’ persistence…].

On this visit to the Ba Na Hills, I experienced the gracious hand in other, shall we say, unanticipated ways. Nobody told me that the only way up there was by cable car. A 20min cable car ride. A 5.7km cable car ride. ‘The longest non-stop single track cable car in the world’ cable car ride … and surely the highest of all cable car rides. Yikes. I was beside myself. “Surely, we can find a road – somewhere.” Nope. No road. Well, I did make it up – just (and so did Barby’s hands – just!). The descent coincided neatly with the time each day when I like to have a shut-eye and so, facing up-hill, I did a bit of that on the way down, with no need for Barby’s hands but still conscious of the other hand, as I did so.

We know grace is undeserved, but sometimes it is unexpected as well.

Just to the right of the destination of the cable car, the bridge – and the two sets of four fingers – can be seen.

Yes, at the top of the Ba Na Hills is this ‘kitsch’-y, kinda fake-European village. I couldn’t make it out. Is there a bit of tongue-in-cheek going on, or is this really for real? I am still not sure…

The little cathedral is just there for show, especially as a backdrop for wedding photos.

But it did lead me to ponder the gracious hand on my life in yet another way: leading me away from the fake and the deceived and on to the true and the really real, in the gospel. But it is not just about me. The local and the indigenous can be found in many places around Da Nang, but I did kinda miss it up there on those Hills. Because one of the things I love about the hand of God expressed in his gracious gospel is that it leads every people, every ‘local and indigenous’, every culture, truly and fully towards all that they were designed to be. Those wretched colonialists may get in the way for a time, but even they cannot stop it happening once the gospel is sown among a people. May it continue to be so…

nice chatting

Paul

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About Me

paul06.16

the art of unpacking

After a childhood in India, a theological training in the USA and a pastoral ministry in Southland (New Zealand), I spent twenty years in theological education in New Zealand — first at Laidlaw College and then at Carey Baptist College, where I served as principal. In 2009 I began working with Langham Partnership and since 2013 I have been the Programme Director (Langham Preaching). Through it all I've cherished the experience of the 'gracious hand of God upon me' and I've relished the opportunity to 'unpack', or exegete, all that I encounter in my walk through life with Jesus.

4 Comments

  1. Peter Anderson on August 14, 2019 at 9:55 pm

    Thanks,Paul. You spoke on the gracious hand of God in Nehemiah at our induction in 2006. I too have been moved thinking of His gracious nail-pierced yet almighty hands — saving, lifting, holding, guiding, comforting, disciplining, giving, blessing etc etc
    Blessings, Peter

  2. Paul on August 16, 2019 at 1:59 pm

    Yes, Peter – it is incredible how precisely I remember that occasion. We went through the phrase, word by word, didn't we? His gracious hand has certainly been on your life over many years. Best wishes, Paul

  3. Unknown on September 28, 2019 at 2:10 pm

    I am reading this on your Birthday Paul. I have just sent you greetings for that. But this is a lovely reflection on the gracious hand of God which has been on you since your Birth 60 years ago. May I borrow some of the ideas to share at a service for the Waimarie Home and Hospital we take fortnightly services for? And a couple of you photos if I can find a way of printing them? My friend Maureen who was scheduled to share a message is in Hospital and will not be able to do it now. I could probably use some of this, with your permission.
    Blessings on your NZ visit with family and friends. Vivienne Richmond

  4. the art of unpacking on November 26, 2019 at 5:45 pm

    Of course, Viv – although I am only seeing your comment now!

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