Do you recognise the painting? It's part of the Sistine Chapel, from the creation scene where God reaches from on high and touches Adam. I love this painting. I love what it represents. Michelangelo said, "To touch can be to give life." And he is right.
Touch tells me that I'm not alone. It tells me that you see me. It tells me that you care. It tells me that you love me. You can talk until you're blue in the face, and your words may be nice and loving and encouraging, and I like to hear them, but they fall on my ears and they enter my head, and that's about as far as they go. You can shower me with gifts, but gifts can be given with strings attached. You can invite me out to dinner, hang out with me, and talk for hours, and all those things are lovely and lovely and I appreciate them, I really do. I know you love me. I know you care.
But sometimes, what I really want, all I really want, is for you to reach out your hand and pat me on the back, give me a hug, punch me on the shoulder (gently, of course), somehow, somehow make contact. Sometimes, what I want, more than anything, is to be able to do that for you and know you're not going to misunderstand or think me weird. Because to touch can be to give life.
But we in North America, and especially in our wi-fi world of data plans and cell phones, are an incredibly low-touch society. We just don't. We think it's weird. Or wrong. It's culturally unacceptable. We barely want to shake hands in church, lest we pick up germs. And really, I'm not interested in hugging strangers or going around touching or being touched by random people I don't know or aren't good friends with. Touch can give life, but it can also bring death and destruction. I know what unsafe touch feels like. I used to fear and hate touch. Sometimes I still do. I'm not a touchy-feely sort of person who gets hands-on with everyone, nor do I want to. But I have learned how much I need it.
Don't get me wrong. It's not like I don't have friends or that I think I'm unloved. I have fantastic friends, and I know beyond any doubt that I am deeply loved. When I am with my friends, we hug. But even great friends, apart from an initial greeting, might touch each other only once or twice over the course of hours spent together. (In South American countries, that could be well over 150 times.) Even great friends generally don't do much touching. There are days (and occasionally even weeks, depending on the circumstances) that can go by when there is no physical human contact. And that hurts inside.
I try to settle for this:
"I'm sending you a hug."
Or this:
((hug))
Sometimes that's about as good as it gets. It's as close to touch as I get. But it's not touch, and sometimes it makes me feel drier than ever.
There are times when I wish I could feel Jesus. I don't mean that I wish I could sense his presence, but that I wish I could really feel him. I wish he could pat me on the back. I wish he could put his arms around me and hug me. I wish he could hold me when I'm crying. I wish he could take my face in his hands and look me in the eye and tell me it was going to be ok. I wish I could feel him. I know that I know that I know that if he was here (or I was there) he would wrap his arms around me and it would be the most wonderful thing. His touch would be life. I know he would touch me.
But he's not here, at least not in flesh-and-blood.
And I'm not sure what it's supposed to look like. I know that there are lots of people who are perfectly ok with hands-off. I respect that. I'm not likely to singlehandedly change a culture. I'm not even sure that it's not my problem, that I'm not the one who's just a little weird (although I surely hope not, because I'm writing about it in a public forum.) Mostly, I think it just is what it is, and I have to accept it and be ok regardless. I know that I am loved. And when feelings fight with fact, fact must always trump.
So I settle for petting the dog. I know it's ok to pet the dog.
She comes and lays her head in my lap, and I pet her. She shoves her nose under my arm and snuffles in my pockets, and I pet her. She comes up to me when I come home and she leans up against me and I pet her and hug her, and it all goes straight past my head into my heart.
Which is sad and ironic, in a way. My head knows that my dog can't truly love me. She is, after all, just a dog, and not a human being. But my heart tells me she does. And my head knows that my friends and family, and especially my Saviour do love me, deeply, profoundly, unconditionally. I know that they love me. I know that I am not alone.
But sometimes my heart feels too dry to feel it.
What brought this all on, you ask? Good question. My dog is sick. And, for the last couple of days, I've been contemplating the possibility that she might not make it. That she might not be there to put her head in my lap, to nudge my arm, or lean against me when I come home. That she might not be there for me to pet and hug when my heart is aching, just to feel there's another living, breathing being here. I can hardly think about it without tears. I don't know it for sure. She might be ok. I keep praying she will be ok. But it's made me think about why it would be so hard if she was gone. I finally realised, I would miss her physical presence. I would miss her touch.
To touch can be to give life. Even if it's just a dog.
Without touch?
Tears.
And if you're out there and reading this? Please don't send ((hugs)).
Just pray for my dog.
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