Held By Tender Hands

I am a reed, but not like others.

I suppose I should be. I grow by the quiet waters of a sheltered pond. In the late Summer evenings I watch the same dance of the Dragonfly as she gently kisses the smooth surface and momentarily shatters the mirrored sky. I grow beneath the sprawling branches of an ancient tree that drinks the same water I do. I grow among my brethren, other reeds who bow their heads each evening, only to lift them again to greet the rising sun, nodding with the warm breeze that carries the smell of earth and harvest. I don’t grow alone.

I am a reed, but not like the others.

Oh, it may appear I am the clone of those who gather round me; tall and straight I stretch toward the sky. The creatures of the wetland make their home around my feet, the birds of the air come to harvest from my crown, and like my brethren, one day the workers from the village will come and harvest us to weave into their art. We reeds have a noble calling. But I am not like the others.

I am wounded. The fibres of my being have faltered. Where others stand strong and secure, I feel the soft place within, the weakness that threatens to topple me. While others sway with the gentle evening breeze, I fear that their breeze will be my storm. Rather than sway, I bend, and I know that one day the bend will become a break.

I am bruised.

When the other reeds of the river are woven into tapestries of beauty, I will not be wound around my brothers, I will still be standing here, alone. Or worse, I will be hewn in half and thrown down; a bruised reed broken and left behind. I’m sure it is only a matter of time. Like the fire that burns the chaff away, when it has done its intended work the labourers of the field stamp out the smouldering remains. Or like the nightwatchman who blows out the candle before the smouldering wick stings his eyes with unwanted smoke, so my tall crown will be cast down to the mud in which I stand.

And so here I tremble, a bruised reed who will not feel the sharp edge of the scythe, but instead the calloused hand of the harvester who will break me away in favour for those who have withstood the season of storms.

I am a reed, but not like the others.

Then, one new day as the sun treads its well worn path across the blue parchment above, as the ancient story unveils another chapter, I see the workers make their own well-rehearsed journey toward the bank where I grow. Like a dream I’ve dreamt before, the baskets swing from their sides, empty now, but later filled as they retrace their steps, tired from a day of labour. I watch them come in the morn, and I know that I will watch them leave again in the eve—it is the way of every bruised reed—broken and left behind.

But then I feel his hands; it was not what I had expected.

He was a harvester, but not like the others. I feel his hands upon my crown, expertly exposing my shame, running gently across the weakness of my being, wrapping themselves around my wounds. The hard hands of the worker are more tender than I thought were possible, as precise in their diagnosis of my suffering as the well-practiced hands of a man of the fields should be.

These hands held me. The rising sun could not kiss me so tenderly as these hands held me now. To be held by tender hands, especially when my wounds were so evident beneath them, when my bruising made me prone to shrinking away, was the sweetest gift of life I’d ever tasted. Not broken. Not cast aside. Not trampled beneath. Not left. Not forgotten. But held.

I’ve been held in tender hands.

““This is my servant; I strengthen him, this is my chosen one; I delight in him. I have put my Spirit on him; he will bring justice to the nations. He will not cry out or shout or make his voice heard in the streets. He will not break a bruised reed, and he will not put out a smoldering wick; he will faithfully bring justice. He will not grow weak or be discouraged until he has established justice on earth. The coasts and islands will wait for his instruction.”” (Isaiah 42:1–4, CSB)

Dear friend, look to Jesus in your wounded years. He sees your bruising, the yellowed remains of your suffering. There is no need to hide them away, to disguise your pain, or to pretend that it does not still hurt. He sees it all.

Dear friend, bring your bruises to Jesus. He will not break you off and caste you aside. That little bit of flame that remains, the small glow that just burns in desperate defiance of the approaching night, he will not snuff it out. The breath he breaths on you is to fan that smouldering wick into flame again. The hands that hold you now are not to caste you aside, but to draw you near.

Take courage, my friend, from one bruised reed to another, you need not fear the touch of Jesus.