Unhand Me, Lord. I’m Coping.

There are certain instructions in the Bible that sound incredibly reasonable when I am reading them from the comfort of my chair.

Forgive.

Trust Me.

Be still.

Do not be anxious.

Love your enemies.

Take every thought captive.

Stretch out your hand.

Absolutely, Lord.

Beautiful.

Powerful.

I have highlighted it.

Underlined it.

Probably written something profound in the margin.

May have even whispered, “That’ll preach.”

Then God asks me to actually do it & suddenly I need to speak with management.

Because apparently there is a difference between admiring Scripture & submitting to it.

Mark 3:1-6 tells the story of Jesus entering the synagogue where there was a man with a shriveled hand. The Pharisees were watching Jesus closely, not because they were hoping to witness restoration, but because they were looking for a reason to accuse Him.

Which already makes me uncomfortable because it is entirely possible to be close enough to Jesus to watch Him work while still being more committed to being right than being changed.

Ouch.

The man is standing there with a hand that no longer functions the way it was intended to function.

& maybe that is why this passage has been bothering me.

Because I have hands too.

Not merely the two attached to my wrists.

I have places in my life that God designed to reach, hold, release, build, serve, surrender, receive, comfort, create, worship & fight that have sometimes become spiritually withered because of what I have experienced.

There are parts of me that technically still exist but have not been functioning according to their original design.

My trust has had arthritis.

My patience has occasionally needed physical therapy.

My forgiveness has been walking around in a wrist brace.

& depending on the day, my self-control may qualify for short-term disability.

I love Jesus.

Deeply.

But if we are being transparent, sometimes I have loved Jesus while developing very sophisticated coping mechanisms for the parts of myself I did not believe could actually be restored.

I learned how to function around them.

I learned how to compensate.

I learned how to protect myself.

I learned how to anticipate disappointment.

I learned how to rehearse conversations that had not happened yet.

I learned how to build entire cinematic universes in my imagination based on one facial expression, one delayed text message & approximately three ounces of circumstantial evidence.

Steven Spielberg could never.

Give me twenty minutes, an ambiguous tone & an unresolved feeling & apparently I can produce, direct & star in a psychological thriller.

Coming this fall:

“She Said ‘Okay’ With a Period.”

Rated PG-13 for imagined conflict & unnecessary emotional distress.

But God has been showing me that coping & healing are not always the same thing.

Sometimes I have gotten so good at living with a withered place that I stopped asking whether Jesus intended for me to keep living that way.

The man in Mark 3 was in the synagogue.

That detail gets me.

He was in the right environment while carrying something dysfunctional.

Which means I can be in church & still cope.

I can worship & still cope.

I can read my Bible every morning & still cope.

I can know Scripture & still have areas of my life operating from wounds, fear, offense, control, pride or self-protection.

Being in proximity to truth does not automatically mean I have allowed truth to transform me.

Jesus tells the man, “Stand up in front of everyone.”

Sir.

Can we discuss the privacy policy first?

Because why does healing always seem to involve something I would prefer to keep tucked discreetly behind my back?

Jesus could have healed him quietly.

Instead, He called him into proximity.

Come here.

That has been another uncomfortable realization for me.

Sometimes the thing I am asking God to fix is also the thing He is using to eliminate distance between us.

I want Him to remove the problem.

He wants the problem to move me closer.

Rude.

Respectfully.

I have spent enough time with God now to recognize that sometimes His answer to my discomfort is not immediate deliverance.

Sometimes it is proximity.

“Come here.”

Come here with the offense.

Come here with the anger.

Come here with the fear.

Come here with the need to control the outcome.

Come here with the part of you that wants peace while simultaneously conducting imaginary depositions against everyone who has ever annoyed you.

Come here with your hypersensitivity.

Come here with your expectations.

Come here with your disappointment.

Come here with the part of you that knows better but has not consistently lived better.

That one especially.

Because there has been an uncomfortable gap in my life between what I cognitively believe & what I functionally practice.

I know God is sovereign.

Yet sometimes I behave as though the entire operation will collapse if I stop supervising it.

I know God is my defender.

Yet occasionally I am preparing Exhibit A through Exhibit Q in the Court of “Things Jazmin Would Like to Clarify”.

I know God tells me to forgive.

Meanwhile my imagination has already assembled a reunion episode complete with unseen footage.

“Previously on The Real Housewives of My Offended Imagination…”

I know God tells me to rest.

Yet I have sometimes treated exhaustion like proof that I have been productive enough to deserve rest.

But Sabbath was never supposed to be an ambulance that arrives after I have worked myself into the ground.

Rest is a rhythm.

It is not merely a response to fatigue.

It is a response to accomplishment.

God worked.

God saw what He had done.

God rested.

Meanwhile I have occasionally acted like sitting down before everything is finished will cause the earth to fall off its axis.

Apparently I have been grossly overestimating my position within the Trinity.

Jesus asks the Pharisees whether it is lawful on the Sabbath to do good or evil, to save life or kill.

They remain silent.

& Mark 3:5 says Jesus looked around at them in anger, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts.

That makes me ask a question I do not particularly enjoy:

When Jesus confronts me with truth, am I correctable?

Not, “Do I know Scripture?”

Not, “Can I explain why I responded that way?”

Not, “Can I provide the historical context surrounding my attitude?”

Am I correctable?

Because there is a difference between explanation & repentance.

There is a difference between understanding why I developed a behavior & believing that history gives me permission to keep it.

There is a difference between self-awareness & surrender.

I can know exactly why I struggle with something & still refuse to stretch it toward Jesus.

That is just sophisticated disobedience with excellent vocabulary.

Then Jesus says it.

“Stretch out your hand.”

& this is where the whole passage changes for me.

Because Jesus asks the man to do something his condition suggests he cannot do.

Stretch the thing that does not stretch.

Move the thing that does not move.

Expose the thing you have learned to compensate for.

Offer Me the thing that has not been functioning properly.

Stretch it toward Me.

There is no lengthy explanation.

No seven-step rehabilitation program.

No montage with “Eye of the Tiger” playing while the man gradually regains mobility.

Just:

Stretch.

Out.

Your.

Hand.

It makes me think of every dramatic movie scene where somebody is hanging from a cliff & the hero is reaching down screaming, “Give me your hand!”

Meanwhile the person hanging there is panicking.

“I CAN’T!”

“YOU HAVE TO!”

“I’M SLIPPING!”

“GRAB MY HAND!”

Except spiritually, I have occasionally been hanging three feet off the ground.

God is like, “Jazmin, stretch out your hand.”

& I am screaming like Mufasa just fell into the gorge.

“REMEMBER MEEEEEE.”

Girl.

Just reach.

Because maybe faith is not always believing God will magically remove what is uncomfortable.

Sometimes faith is attempting movement in the exact place I have become convinced movement is impossible.

The man stretched out his hand.

& it was completely restored.

The restoration happened in the stretching.

That sentence has been following me around.

Because I keep wanting restoration before obedience.

God, heal my trust & then I will trust.

Heal my fear & then I will move.

Heal my insecurity & then I will show up.

Heal my offense & then I will forgive.

Heal my need for control & then I will surrender.

Make me comfortable & then I will obey.

But what if the healing is waiting inside the stretch?

What if forgiveness is part of stretching my hand?

What if apologizing is stretching my hand?

What if shutting my mouth when every fiber of my flesh has prepared a closing argument is stretching my hand?

What if resting is stretching my hand?

What if allowing someone else to help me is stretching my hand?

What if trusting my husband instead of interrogating a tone, a facial expression or a silence is stretching my hand?

What if refusing to let my imagination write stories that reality never authorized is stretching my hand?

What if admitting, “I was wrong,” without immediately attaching a PowerPoint explaining why I was understandably wrong is stretching my hand?

Because my hands reveal a lot about what I believe.

Hands can grip.

Hands can release.

Hands can receive.

Hands can serve.

Hands can defend.

Hands can build.

Hands can worship.

Hands can applaud.

Hands can point.

Hands can clench.

Hands can surrender.

So when Jesus tells me to stretch out my hand, I cannot help wondering what exactly I have been doing with mine.

Have I been gripping things He told me to release?

Pointing at people when He told me to examine myself?

Building walls He never instructed me to build?

Clenching my fists around outcomes because surrender feels too vulnerable?

Asking Him to put something new in hands that are still full of something old?

That question alone will ruin a perfectly good cup of coffee.

Then Psalm 47:1 says, “Clap your hands, all you nations; shout to God with cries of joy.”

Clapping requires movement.

Participation.

Hands that are functioning.

Praise is not merely observing what God has done.

It is responding to it.

The Hebrew imagery behind clapping carries the idea of “striking with purpose”.

There is something active about it.

Celebration.

Appreciation.

Expectation.

God did it before.

God can do it again.

& I need that reminder because there are places in my life where I am asking God to restore what I previously mismanaged.

Relationships.

Opportunities.

Peace.

Time.

Trust.

Parts of myself.

Luke 15 reminds me that restoration is part of the Father’s heart.

But restoration requires me to return.

I cannot demand that God restore something while refusing to let Him lead it.

Because God cannot save a life I insist on directing.

He is Lord & Savior.

Not Lord or Savior.

& whew.

There goes my control issue again, asking whether there is perhaps a third option.

There is not.

The more I understand who I am in Christ, the more I realize that revelation should eventually produce revolution.

If God reveals who I am, something about what I tolerate should change.

Something about how I think should change.

Something about how I speak should change.

Something about how I respond should change.

Something about what I allow access to me should change.

Humility does not require pretending I have nothing valuable to offer.

That is not humility.

Sometimes that is insecurity wearing church clothes.

I am learning that I can acknowledge the gifts God placed inside me without making myself the source of them.

Arrogance is forgetting where it came from.

Humility is knowing exactly where it came from.

I am an asset.

That sentence used to make me uncomfortable.

Because somewhere along the way I confused shrinking with humility.

But if God gave me something, pretending it does not exist does not honor Him.

I can know I am gifted & still know Who gave the gift.

I can know I carry something valuable & still bow before the One who put it there.

I can be confident without becoming conceited.

I can be humble without becoming naive.

Because naivety is not holiness either.

The enemy loves an unaware believer.

There are things God has been showing me that I can no longer pretend I do not see.

Patterns.

Triggers.

Strengths.

Weaknesses.

Gifts.

Responsibilities.

Places where I have matured.

Places where I still need Jesus to come collect me immediately.

Awareness creates responsibility.

Relationships do too.

I have been thinking about love languages & how easily we understand that concept with people.

Words of affirmation.

Quality time.

Acts of service.

Receiving gifts.

Physical touch.

If someone I love receives love differently than I naturally give it, maturity requires me to learn them.

I cannot keep giving someone what is convenient for me & calling it love simply because my intentions were good.

Relationships require more than romance.

They require responsibility.

& suddenly I started thinking about Jesus.

Because I want all five from Him.

I want His words of affirmation.

His quality time.

His acts of service.

His gifts.

His touch.

Yes Lord, run me the whole package.

Premium subscription.

No ads.

But what language does my life speak back to Him?

Praise is my affirmation.

Devotion is my quality time.

Service is what I do with what He has placed in my hands.

Worship is how I reach toward Him.

& obedience may be the most intimate language of all.

Because saying “I love You” is beautiful.

Stretching out my hand when He asks is relationship.

So lately I have been looking at my hands differently.

Not physically.

Spiritually.

What am I holding?

What am I withholding?

What am I reaching for?

What am I refusing to release?

What have I allowed to become withered because I learned how to function without healing it?

Where have I developed coping mechanisms around something Jesus wants to restore?

Where am I waiting for God to move while He is telling me to stretch?

& perhaps the most uncomfortable question:

What if the hand I keep asking God to heal is already capable of moving enough to obey Him?

Maybe I do not need another confirmation.

Maybe I do not need another sign.

Maybe I do not need another sermon, another journal entry, another perfectly timed Instagram reel that somehow knows entirely too much about my business.

Maybe Jesus is simply standing in front of me saying,

“Come here.”

“Stretch out your hand.”

Because maybe some problems really are being used to solve my problem with distance.

Maybe this season is not merely about what God is removing.

Maybe it is about how close I am willing to come.

& maybe restoration is not going to begin when I finally feel fearless, healed, prepared, unoffended, emotionally regulated & spiritually impressive.

Maybe restoration begins with one trembling hand moving toward Jesus anyway.

So…

Where them hands at?

Because apparently mine have some stretching to do.