Do we really know what clean hands
look like?
We who would be pure
To handle holy things,
To shine our righteousness
Like some kind of human lighthouse,
With our germicidal soap,
And carefully trimmed nails
(Nothing too ostentatious,
Perhaps a ring or two,
We are keeping cleanly-chic)
Do we know what clean hands are?
We with hands neat-folded
Round tidy Sabbath bibles
(Taken from week-day shelves),
Shaking clergy-hands
With appropriate pious words,
Do we know?
Do we know what clean hands are?
Hands that are wet with tears,
Calloused in service,
Hands that reach out to touch,
Reach out to bless,
Reach out to pull a brother from
the mire
(Knowing how much that sucking mud
can cling)
Hands that lift children,
That hold each other in the face of
death,
Comfort each other in the face of
pain,
Or link united against some
injustice,
These are clean hands.
And there are hands
Wrung with the agony of wordless
prayer,
Held up to God in desperate
supplication,
Willing to wear his nail prints as
our own,
Willing to do the unexciting work
That helps the Kingdom come.
Hands washed clean
By Christ’s own blood,
Hands fit to serve our God.
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