Twila Paris Music Video
Folks, this is an old one. I wrote it years ago and sent it out on the email wire. I received it back last night with a note from a person who said I should read it. Made me smile. Unless you are in my age group, you may not recognize the names of the individuals here, but the message still resounds...enjoy.

The Hands

 My wife and I were arguing.  Yeah, even though we have the perfect marriage, every now and then we argue.  And we argue over very important things in life.  Why waste all that energy over something that is not going to change the course of the whole human race?  In this particular case we were in the New Orleans Convention Center and the point of dispute was whether we were suppose to go to Hall 1 or Hall I.  The way the directions were written we couldn't tell if it was a number or a letter and the Convention Hall was huge.  The argument raged. 

There is no way today that I can tell you which position I was taking  (although I am sure my wife remembers the details including what smells we passed in the food court, but that is another topic for another time).  However, the battle was real and intense.  Even when we finally got to the correct Hall, I was still upset.   I knew I needed to seek God, seek his forgiveness, and seek a better understanding of how I let things like this happen.  It was clearly a failure on my part to allow my wife's and my relationship to deteriorate to such a position that we would argue over such a minor issue.  So I did the best Godly thing I could think of.  I went and bought a newspaper and a cup of coffee and sat at a little table and sulked. 

We were attending the International Christian Book Sellers Annual Convention.  This is a week filled with activity that almost every book store owner wants to see.  During the convention, authors and musicians make themselves available for pictures and autographs.  In most instances, they are showing off their new books or songs and they want you to listen to them.  The convention floor in New Orleans was over a half mile long and 100 yards wide.  Almost every publisher, producer, and artist who sells to Christian book stores is present. 

I have to admit, going to these huge conventions is not my idea of the best way to spend a week of my vacation. My wife is the book store owner and this is "her thing".  I am an executive in a software company and when I go on vacation I want to be able to relax and listen to waves crashing on the beach or the wind flowing through some pines, or a babbling brook.  It took a lot for her to persuade me to go to my first convention a few years back.  Prior to that I was always able to convince her to take a friend.  But, as a testimony to our strong marriage, she wanted me, her best friend, to go and enjoy it with her.  When I finally went the first time, I got hooked. 

I think the moment that "hooked" me was late one afternoon.  I was very tired.  I had walked the convention floor all day and talked to hundreds of people.  You are never alone and people are always approaching you to educate you on something new they are doing.  I had spied a sofa in one of the booths on the convention floor earlier in the day.  It was tucked away in an area where there were few people roaming around.  That very sofa was where I was heading.  When I found it, there was another man sitting on it and I could tell he was as tired as me.  I sat down on the opposite end of the sofa and as two typical adult men; we didn't even look at each other.  Finally, after what was almost an hour of sitting in silence (very nice) the man at the other end of the sofa asked me how I was enjoying the show.  I told him it was my first time and our conversation ensued from there.  It turned out that this man was Randy Alcorn. 

Randy has written several books and he offered me his latest which at that time was one called Deadline.  After about thirty minutes of talking, the show floor was closing and we parted ways.  This one chance meeting with a man who is an excellent author and he treating me as just a normal person, giving me my space and then talking to me when it was time, is the point where I decided I liked going to these conventions. 

However, at this particular moment, two years later, with newspaper and coffee in hand, I wasn't enjoying it very much. As a matter of fact, I was burying myself in the newspaper in hopes that no one would talk to me.  I didn't want to be talking to anyone at this time.  I needed to make this argument last much longer than it already had. 

Several people tried to prevent me from doing that.  First was a reporter who wanted my opinion on last night's concert.  I grumbled something to him, and he left much too happy of a person for that early in the morning.  Then there was the big guy with the deep voice (in hindsight he was probably Ron Kenoly).  He wanted to know if he could join me at my table.  I grumbled something to him, too, and made sure he saw how upset I was that I couldn't have my paper spread across the entire table.  He only sat down for a few minutes.  I buried my head in the paper.  I never read anything in the paper.

God was working on me then.  I knew my actions were pathetic - both with my wife and with others.  They were pathetic with God, too.  One of the things I have learned over the years is that when God needs to deal, I let Him deal.  Although I may have been trying to hide, it was because I knew God needed to deal and I was exposed in the big convention hall. As soon as the deep-voiced man got up and left, the tears started coming.  This happens to me at times.  I know God is working and I start to cry for no particular reason.  My spirit probably knows the real reasons and as He does his work in me, the tears come forth.  I let them come slowly becoming less and less aware of anyone around me.  What comes to the surface is what most middle-aged men have to deal with on a daily basis. 

I was crying out to God about knowing His will for my life, missing His calling for that day, wanting to know when I would know I was where He wants me to be.  How hard I work toward being the person He wants and how miserably I fail over and over again and again.  Will I ever really know?  How will I know when I am at my peak?  How will I know when I am at my prime?  Am I destined to work harder and harder every day of my life?  Is there any point in this life when I can sit back, relax, and enjoy the rest of the ride?  Or must I toil every day of my life? 

Success is not an issue for I am successful by most standards.  Salvation is not an issue, for I am saved.  Holiness is the issue.  If my light is to shine so that others may marvel at my works and give glory to Him, how can I do that in a holy way?  Certainly not by arguing with the one God provided as my partner. Certainly not by allowing little things of the world to engulf the energies of this body created to worship Him.  Certainly not by allowing my mind to wish my partner wrong even if only in such a little matter.  Holiness.  Only by His mercy.  Only through His grace.  So the tears flow.  And His cleansing begins. 

Finally I see where the music is coming from.  At 8:30 in the morning, far earlier than a time that anyone should be this happy, Twila Paris is sitting at a grand piano singing her heart out to God.  They have a TV camera on her, but there are few people there to listen, so the camera doesn't add much.  The thought goes through my mind that this is exactly what I am telling God.  Here she is at the peak of her career effortlessly doing the very thing that God put her on this earth to do - draw others, like me, to Him through her music.  It is so perfect, so clear, and so effortless.  God, I tell Him, that is exactly the idea I am dealing with.  It is the very issue I struggle with.  Here she is at her peak, doing exactly what God put her on this earth to do.  She does it so well and so easily.  How come it is so easy for her, yet so hard for a "normal" person like me? 

I am having this conversation with God as the music continues to pierce my very soul.  As I hear the words, the shivers cover my body and tears continue to come.  I am here, in the center of the New Orleans Convention Center, having an intimate moment with my Lord, my Savior, my God, my Friend.  I continue watching and for some reason my eyes are drawn to the TV screen where the TV camera's image is being projected.  The camera man continues giving different scenes and at this moment, he centers on a very close image of Twila's hands on the keyboards. That is when I see them.  The hands. 

Twila probably won't like this, but God showed me her hands.  I remember that moment as if it were today and even as I write this I can sense the emotion I was feeling at that time.  For me, that is pretty incredible.  There are few events in my life I can remember with such clarity.  I see the hands as they glide effortlessly along the keyboards, but the effortlessness slowly fades as God brings to the forefront the very thing He wants me to see. 

I see the hands.  They are nice hands.  Very clean.  Nails trimmed to perfection.  Then I see even closer.  They are wrinkled and even cracked.  I stare at those hands.  How can such beauty, such pure worship, such power, come from what looked like hands that were chapped and very clearly had worked those keyboards thousands and thousands of times?  I then realized that these were hands that had toiled for many years.  They had played and played in cold halls and in hot churches.  They had flown along those keys even when it hurt to even move them.  How many mornings had Twila awoken when everything within her didn't want to go out on some stage somewhere and play her music?  How many times had she wished she could be in some place and simply listen to the waves crashing against the beach instead of being with the multitudes of people? 

There is no way for me to know if any of these things ever crossed her mind, but I am willing to bet they have at some time.  And if not these things, then desires of her heart that are of equal measure.  I realized that this being, this very person that was singing, doing the very thing God put her on this earth to do, was serving Him in the best way she knew how.  In most ways she probably wasn't any different than this software puke trying to make enough of a living to keep a small Christian book store open to serve the local community.  And in every way, as part of the body of Christ, she was just as beautiful.  Or more miraculously, I was just as beautiful as her. 

I lie down on the hard concrete floor and put my head on my backpack. I continued to sing along with Twila as this small part of His body gave him worship that morning. 

By this time there were a few more people gathered around.  For a brief moment, I wondered how many of them, like me, God had taken a personal interest in that morning. The worship continued for quite some time.  I was refreshed.  My God does really care for me.  He knew me before He knit me in my mother's womb. He still calls me his child because I act like one so often, but He treats me as His friend who has such worth and value. 

The Creator of the universe decided to spend time with me this morning over coffee and a song.  While He was there, He softened my heart so I could love my wife just a little bit better, appreciate my position in life a whole lot more, and understand just how beautiful He thinks I am when I am a part of His body. 

Holiness.  It will come.  Slowly.  At God's pace - not mine.  I want it and I want it now!  Good, my child, He says.  That is a good heart. Now, let Me show you how to be more holy today.   I saw a little piece of it in those hands.  Our daily toil is required of us in this world. And we all grow old.  The toil hurts.  It makes us weak.  But we do it.  We must do it.  He wants us to do it.  And when He deems it right, we will be at the peak of our career, at the top of our game.

Twila probably has no idea that God ministered to me through her that day.  From a very narrow, selfish perspective, I could say she was at her best that day.  However, now I realize, as long as she is serving God with her heart, mind, and strength, He is the one to assure she will be at her peak when she needs to be.  He is also the one who will have her forget to put hand cream on her hands one day so that a troubled man might see those hands and marvel at her works and give glory to God. 

Laying there on the convention center floor with God, I realize there is no way for me to govern my work.  It is my place to serve Him with all my heart, mind, and strength.  Every thing else is just details that He takes care to provide.  And when He provides, there is nothing missing.  My every step is directed by Him.  My everyday toil is given to Him to be glorified.  Maybe, in some way, somehow, my hands may bring a message of His love to some lost struggling soul like Twila's hands did for me that day.  Like Twila, I'll probably never know. 

But, for now, that is ok.  May God be glorified.