Scars

 

My brother Phillip was two years younger than me.  When he was about a year old, he was anxious for supper, so he toddled over to the stove where he knew that his food would be coming from.  He reached up on top of the stove to help himself and pulled at a scalding bowl of green peas.  The hot peas spilled down on top of him burning his neck and causing a scar that Phillip carried for the rest of his life.  Hey, accidents happen and often scars are the result.  The same is true in our spiritual lives.  We may be forgiven of terrible sins, but their scars remain.  Divorce, jail time, fractured relationships - all these can be forgiven, but the scars remain.  Oh, my dear friend, how much better to have never had those scars!  But there are scars that are beautiful!  Isaiah prophesied of the Lord Jesus Christ in Isaiah 53:5, “But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.”  Our spiritual scars may be a source of embarrassment, but the scars of Jesus are beautiful scars because they are testimonies of the grace of God for us.  How beautiful they are for our behalf!