Hidden Scars

We all wear our scars.  My pinkie finger has a mark that was made back in the day when families would go to drive in movies and the speaker would be pulled in and then out of the car window.  My leg did battle one afternoon with a lawn mower and then there is the forearm marking from some skin cancer surgery.  There are a few others worthy of honorable mention,but  a few make the point that we are all scarred people.  Life has a way of leaving its marks on us as we move through the years.   

And as surely as there are visible scars from past struggles so are there scars within which no one really sees unless we decide in a moment of vulnerability to share them.  Acts of betrayal can cause us to never trust again, church battles can make us suspect of anything and anyone that smacks of Christianity, and a spoken word meant to hurt still seems like an arrow that has pierced our heart.  Like the physical hurts that scar us, these inner wounds may heal over, but the pain may from them may come again and again like the joint pain some old timer says comes when the weather changes. It seems that they will simply never cease to limit our living keeping us from the joy that we long to know in our life.   

And, indeed, this is true if we depend only on our own attempts at healing.  There is a balm that heals even the worst scars of the heart.  When Christ went to the cross to die for the sins of those who were persecuting Him, the power of reconciliation, forgiveness, and love was poured out upon humanity in such measure that our scars from the past no longer have a hold on us.  To embrace this gift from the cross is to bring it into our life in such a way that our inner healing becomes possible and the destroying power of our scarred soul is broken.  For so many of us, it is a gift waiting to be received.