Scars

The scars of life come upon us as a race of God's creatures. Sometimes the scars are made before we are born as we are just being formed in the womb. Sometimes the scars of our life are made minutes before our death. There is often no rhyme or reason to any of the madness that puts the scars of living upon us. It is the satanic way of evil to inflict the scars upon our hearts, minds, souls, and bodies in a random fashion. Satanic evil lies hidden and inflicts its horrendous pain upon us from any direction.

In the world and in our lives there is war, hatred, violence, sin, corruption, natural disasters, man-made disasters, depressions, times of excess, and temptations. All of these can leave scars upon us that last a lifetime. As we look in the mirror, we may often wonder why God would let such terrible things happen to us and to others. As we look in the mirror, we must often wonder what to do about the scars, if we are able to look in the mirror at all.

In coming to grips with the relationship between our scars and God we must always rest our life in the palm of God's hand. We must remain in His hand in faith, hope, and love for Him. If you love God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your might, then your scars take on a new perspective. If you totally immerse your life in His love, eventually the scars are erased in His love and are no more. For if we love God enough, we eventually learn not to question Him about why things happen. As we grow in faith, instead of questioning Him about why things happen, we ask God how we can love Him and others more fully, regardless of our scars.

We get our scars not because God does not love us but because Satan hates us. This idea, the idea that Satan hates us, is an awful and inescapable truth. This idea that Satan hates us is a truth we do not want to think about, for if we tell the truth about this truth, we must tell the truth that we are nearly helpless against Satan in our physical existence. The truth is that we humans are in a war in which all of us will die. In the soup of good and evil in which we live, Satan is attacking us and attacking the work of God in us. In the last analysis, we cannot make Satan go away and stop bothering us, for we will all die and to those left behind life will seem like Satan has won. In the physical world, in the flesh, Satan will win when we die. However, in the spiritual, in the cosmic eternal everlasting energy of love we call God, we can win through Christ.

Christ came to show us that even if we carry our scars for a lifetime, that in the end…in the last second after we die…there is a land of spiritual milk and honey waiting for us where scars are no more. Christ came to show us there is a time and place where all our hurts, problems, bad memories, psychological scars, and physical scars are washed away and do not exist any more.

Obviously, we all want the washing away of our scars to be in the here and now. We all want to be ridden of our scars in this life so we can be happy and live in peace and contentment. Scars get erased by the healing energy of Christ's love flowing through us. Scars get erased by the healing energy of Christ's love that flows from the very hem of His garment as we reach out to touch Him.

Luke 8:42 As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him. 43 And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, but no one could heal her. 44 She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped. 45 "Who touched me?" Jesus asked. When they all denied it, Peter said, "Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you." 46 But Jesus said, "Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me." 47 Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. 48 Then he said to her, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace." (NIV)

For those of us who have deep scars, the story of healing from touching His garment is particularly meaningful. For in this story, the healing comes not from Christ going to someone who needs Him. In this story, someone goes to Him. In this story of healing, we see an activist woman not wanting to be noticed by Christ. She does not request an audience. She does not stand up before Christ and request a healing. She does not conform herself to customs, rights, and rituals. This woman is determined and is full of faith.

Perhaps she is determined and full of faith as a last resort. For some of us take our scars with us each day and as each day passes we are burdened down with increasing darkness. Out of our desperation, we call to God just as this woman reached out to touch the hem of the Lord's garment. What we must remember that healing came to this woman because this woman reached out in faith.

Each of us can reach out in faith, because Christ's garment is just as present in our heart today as was His garment 2000 years ago to this woman. Christ is there for us to heal us and make us whole. Christ is there for us to take away our scars. It is a tragedy of the greatest proportions when we believe otherwise. It is a tragedy of the greatest proportions when we believe that Christ is somehow implicated in the making of our scars or in the causing of events that bring the scars into our life. Christ is not the enemy of our life. Satan is the enemy that will scar us and kill us. Satan is the enemy that will hurt us beyond what we think we can endure. Satan is the one who destroys every human life.

When we fully understand who the enemy is and we fully understand who Christ is, we begin to be in a position to choose Christ's way. For when we begin to doubt God because we see our scars or live with our scars, Satan has won a round against us. We must realize that Satan not only scars our lives. Satan also tries to convince us that God is to blame for our pain, suffering, and scarring. It is Satan's objective to get you to implicate God in every terrible thing in life. For when you implicate God in every terrible event, you can blame God and hold God accountable for the evil and suffering put upon you by Satan. Evil criminals do this blame game scenario. Criminals routinely blame others for their actions, even trying to convince a judge, jury, and victims that the criminal is innocent. Or if the criminal cannot convince others the criminal is innocent, then the criminal tries to convince others that others are really to blame for the criminal's bad behavior.

Satan will try to convince you that God is responsible for your scars. Satan will try to convince you that God is in total control of all things and that God made, permitted, or caused your trauma that left the scars. The idea of God being in total control of all things is a deception. God is not in control of us because we are not God's robots. We are not mind-controlled by God. God gave us freedom to choose between good and evil, right and wrong, God and Satan. When we are able to understand we have a choice, we are then able to make a choice for Christ and His healing touch. When we are under the illusion we cannot make a choice and that all things are moving in a direction under God's control and beyond our control, we can blame God for all the out of control scarring that goes on in our life.

There is, on God's part, a not-so-hidden agenda when it comes to our healing. God's agenda in our healing is to use our heart, mind, and soul to overcome our unbelief. God's agenda in our healing is to use our heart, mind, and soul to choose God and to choose to be unseen and unnoticed to touch His garment. For in our acts of humble contrition and faithful love, God is glorified. In our acts of humble contrition and faithful love, God wins victories. In our acts of humble contrition and faithful love, comes an erasing of scars.

Some of us will have our scars erased in this life. Some of us will have our scars erased in heaven. In either case, whether scars are erased now or later, scars are erased. Scars are erased because Christ loves us.

Christ's hand is reaching out to you today. For today, you need not try to touch His garment. Today you can touch His hand and feel His love erase the scars.

Precious Lord Jesus, call again to this reader. Reach out again to this reader's heart. No matter what the circumstances might be, reach through those circumstances and touch this person so they will hear you calling upon their life and heart. Amen.