Easter Scars
Then He said to Thomas, “Reach your finger here, and look at My hands;
and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.”
John 20:27
There is one detail in the Easter story that has always intrigued me. Why did the risen Lord Jesus keep the scars from His crucifixion? Presumably He could have had any resurrected body He wanted, and yet He chose one identifiable mainly by scars that could be seen and touched. Why?
I believe the story of Easter would be incomplete without those scars on the hands, the feet, and the side of the Lord (John 20:27). We Human beings dream of pearly straight teeth and wrinkle-free skin and ideal body shapes. We dream of an unnatural state: the perfect body. But for the Lord Jesus, being confined in a skeleton and human skin was the unnatural state. The scars are a permanent reminder of His days of confinement and suffering on our planet.
From the perspective of heaven, those scars represent the most horrible event that has ever happened in the history of the universe. Even that event, though, turned into a memory. Because of Easter, we can hope that the tears we shed, the struggles we endure, the emotional pain, the heartache over the death of friends and loved ones—all these will become memories, like the scars of the Lord Jesus. Scars never completely go away, but neither do they hurt any longer.
Read
John 20:24-29.
Prayer
Dear Father, may I realize afresh today what the death and resurrection of Your Son, means for sinners like me. Amen.
Comentarios