Useless Hands and Words that Saved

“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”

The words are foreign to my ears.

Who is this man who prays a prayer so selfless?

A criminal, as I am?

He must be who they say He is. Though they mock.

They say He saved others.

They told Him to save Himself.

They say He’s a King.

I’ve known criminals, as I am.

But this man said, “Father, Forgive.”

No criminal would die with a prayer on His lips like this one.

No one would die like this.

But a King.

I’ve lived a wicked, self-filled life.

I’m not worthy to be this close to such a man.

Unworthy to die so close to a man who saves.

A man so kingly.

He saved others?

Can He? Will He save me?

Can a dying man save?

“Lord, remember me in your Kingdom.”

I breathe out the words in agony. The last words that will ever cross my lips.

I plead with a man whose hands are nailed to a cross.

Nailed hard and stopped.

But a man so kingly, a man who saved others, a man who would breathe a prayer of forgiveness, though wracked with pain.  He can save.

His words alone can save.

My hands are also nailed.

But these hands have been wicked. These hands have robbed, cheated, expressed over and over again rebellion against the One who made me.

Now they are stopped.

Nailed hard and useless.

They can’t go back and undo.

They can’t make up for a life of sin.

They can do nothing to save.

Please “Remember.”

This is all my believing heart and confessing lips can plead.

My last words speak what my hands can’t do.

They speak dependence upon the only One mighty to save.

In the same agony as I, He promises me a place.

“Truly I say to you, Today, you will be with me in paradise.”

His hands are stopped.

But His words speak a promise.

You will be with Me.

In a place better than this one.

Today.

The sun begins to set, my hands ache, but my heart rejoices.

My hands are stopped from sin and useless to save.

But a dying man mighty to save spoke a promise.

He saved others.

He didn’t save Himself.

Instead, He saved me.

“Who his own self bore our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness; by whose stripes ye were healed.” (1 Peter 2:24)

Click here to listen to “The Thief on the Cross.”