The Scars

I mowed a little too deeply in one strip of our lawn yesterday. Right down the middle of the lawn! I know it will very quickly recover and look like the rest, but sitting here, looking over my garden, my eyes return over and over to that strip! It's like the rest of the beauty laid out before me fades into insignificance, while my eyes are drawn to the scar.

It seems to be our way as humans. Our brain notices the anomaly. Before it appreciates anything else! And we tend to notice those things in others too! Maybe that's why close relationships can begin to struggle over time - because of those little annoying things we become aware of, that somehow become bigger that what we first loved about them. The scars become more attention grabbing than the beauty - while there still might be plenty of that!

Then my mind drifted to some other scars. The ones Jesus wears. The ones inflicted on him to purchase life for us - not because he did anything to deserve therm. When he came to his disciples in the room where they were hiding, he proved himself to them by showing them his scars! You'd think they would have vanished into his freshly healed body! And yet - he still wore them.

When we are given that perfect life beyond the grave, we are told we will be fully healed of the scars of this life. Yet he still wears them. That seems odd. There must be a reason. Perhaps it is this.

Those scars will constantly be an anomaly in that perfection. The record of a great and terrible gift that had to be made for the amazing life we then get to live. There is no way we would ever want this to happen again. No way we would ever want evil to slide its way back into our existence!

Forever these scars will remind us of devastating love! They will tell how great the love is that God has for his creations! How much he is willing to give to restore them! And remind us that never again do we want to take lordship of our own lives - with all the anguish it results in.

Those scars will stand forever to keep us safely with him. Forever loving the one who loves so much.

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