January 2: A Purposeful Pressure

Narrator: Chris Genthree
 •  1 min. read  •  grade level: 7
Listen from:
SA 38:2 {Have you ever watched the exceedingly delicate and yet firm pressure of the hand of a skillful tuner of string instruments? He will make the string produce a perfectly true note, vibrating in absolute accord with his own never changing tuning-fork. The practiced hand is at one with the accurate ear, and the pressure is brought to bear with most delicate adjustment to the resistance; the tension is never exceeded, he never breaks a string; but he patiently strikes the note again and again, till the tone is true and his ear is satisfied, and then the muscles relax and the pressure ceases. The string may be a poor little thin one, yielding a very small note; but that does not matter at all; it is wanted in its place just as much as a great bass one that can yield a volume of deep sound. The tuner takes just the same pains with it, and is just as satisfied when it vibrates true to the pitch retaining its own individual tone. That string could not tune itself, and no machine was ever invented to accomplish it; nothing but the firm and sensitive pressure of the tuner's own living hand can bring it into tune.
Will you not trust your Tuner, and begin a note of praise, even under the pressure?
'Tis Thy dear hand, O Savior, that presseth sore,
The hand that bears the nail-prints for evermore.
And now beneath its shadow, hidden by Thee,
The pressure only tells me, Thou lovest me!