The finger of God

One digit that can change and transform your life

Word on the street is that God is doing a new thing; apparently, there is what has been termed "a silent revival" underway, with people (mostly young men, it seems) coming spontaneously to church and becoming Christians. I think it's true; I've heard it first-hand from a church plant in London that has grown to around 600 and expects to double in size this year.

The hand of God is on our nation, and perhaps you can relate.

Having said that, God visits us with measured omnipotence - it’s one thing to know the hand of God is on your life - to sense His guidance, His protection, His favour, but have you ever considered what happens when it’s just His finger? One touch. One deliberate moment. And it’s not something you’re waiting for - it’s already happening. For those who are in Christ, the touch of God is not a distant hope but a present and personal reality, reshaping your story even now.

On tablets of plastic and glass, we swipe, we click, we tap with a finger - casual, instinctive movements, but when God moves His finger, He doesn’t scroll by. He intervenes. He transforms. He delivers. He disciplines. He raises the lowly and brings down the proud. One touch from Him - and everything changes: mountains are levelled, the ground shakes, enemies are silenced and defeated, and the dead - the dead come to life.

Jacob personally discovered this in the dark. By the River Jabbok, alone and vulnerable, he was tackled by a stranger - but not just any man. The preincarnate Christ came not to speak softly, but to wrestle Jacob into surrender. It was no performance. This was bruising, breathless, real.

Why would God come this way? To destroy Jacob? Not at all. A single touch to his hip ended any illusion of equality. God’s intent was not to defeat him but to define him — to bring him to the end of himself and name him anew. "And Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day" (Genesis 32:2). One divine touch, and the deceiver was renamed Israel — marked by mercy, limping into his future with a promise he could no longer steal, only receive.

Later, in Egypt, Pharaoh’s magicians watched their power unravel and declared, “This is the finger of God” (Exodus 8:19). Even they knew - God was here, and He wasn’t to be mocked. And in Babylon, King Belshazzar watched a hand appear, writing on the wall. The finger of God brought judgment: “You have been weighed... and found wanting” (Daniel 5:27). The finger of God brings warning as well as wonder.

And then Jesus - God in flesh - stoops to the ground and writes with His finger in the dirt (John 8:6). A woman, caught in adultery, stood before Him in silence. Her shame was public. But Jesus did not join the accusers. One finger, writing in the dust, one moment of mystery, and they dropped their stones. The woman met mercy, but there was a man too, who we don't hear about, involved in the same sin, who disappeared into the shadows, untouched, unmoved, unchanged. He missed the finger of God.

The same finger once etched the Law into stone (Exodus 31:18), calling for righteousness. But now, through the gospel, that same God touches hearts. The gospel is the finger of God - pointing us not to guilt, but to grace. It calls us to forgiveness, to reconciliation, to redemption. It removes shame, cancels blame, and ends the cycle of condemnation. It touches us not to crush us, but to make us holy, blameless, alive before Him.

So what has God put His finger on in your life? A habit? A hurt? A hidden place? He does not point to expose you for shame - He points so that He might heal. His touch is firm, but never cruel. His finger leads us to repentance, yes - but always unto life.

And at the cross, we see the full measure of that touch - not merely a finger in the dust or a hand writing on a wall, but arms stretched wide, hands pierced through. The God who wrestled Jacob, who judged kings, who freed the shamed now calls your name. Not with condemnation, but with compassion. Not with wrath, but with redeeming grace.

So much for the finger of God — just one touch... but for you, what is God touching, pointing to, or perhaps where do you need Him to place His omnipotent finger? Is it a habit, an opportunity, or a fresh work of grace? As always, come with faith, conviction, obedience, and hunger for God, and His finger will surely — and gently — touch you. And when He does, nothing will ever be the same again.