With both hands

"whoever is of a willing heart"

Exodus 35:5

I read in interesting verse in Lamentations recently.  It was actually a verse sent to me by someone else, but it was so intriguing, I had to go to my Bible and get the whole story.  I thought it was such a peculiar way to phrase it, I decided I needed the context to help me understand.

The verse was this, Lamentations 3:41 ~ "Let us lift up our hearts with our hands".  I have heard the phrase, "lift up our hearts" before.  It's a beautiful visual of offering the deepest and most vulnerable part of ourselves to Him.  But what does it mean to lift up our hearts with our hands?  And how is that even possible?

Well, when I grabbed my Bible, I got both a better understanding, and a second meaning to the verse.  I think the translation that had been sent to me was King James.  The translation I happened to grab was NIV, and it used different wording; it said, "Let us lift our hearts and our hands."  (emphasis mine).

Ohhh, well that makes much more sense.  Together.  Lifting up our hearts along with our hands, not using our hands to lift our hearts, which would be difficult...

But then I decided to read the whole chapter, you know, cuz I was in the neighborhood.  I highly recommend that.  If God brings you to a neighborhood in the Bible, spend some time there!

And when I read the verse in the context of the chapter, I got even more out of it ~ and would you believe, I went back to my original understanding of verse 41?

Here are verses 40-42:  "Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord.  Let us lift up our hearts and our hands to God in heaven, and say: 'We have sinned and rebelled'". 

That changed it for me.  This passage is about something that's difficult for us to do.  Namely, turn a critical eye on ourselves, and see what God sees.  He sees rebellion where we see justifiable behavior; He sees outright disobedience where we see "no big deal". 

And then when we see what He sees, we need to respond to what we've seen.  And our response needs to be as deliberate as our examination of our actions.  Our response should be to lift our hearts to Him, as purposefully and with as much will as if we were doing so with our own hands. 

It's about His sovereignty, and our acknowledgement of who we are and what's we've done, in light of who He is, and what He has done.   I need to not just offer my heart to Him, but give it to Him.

~ "I have called daily upon You;

I have stretched our my hands to You" ~

Psalm 88:9