Over the last several years, I have shared my scars with safe people. And there have been numerous times when God called me to share my scars, my stories, with certain people he brought into my path. There was never a time, not once, when it was an easy thing to do. It is a very hard and vulnerable thing, especially when some of those scars are self-inflicted.
Those scars of self-inflicted choices are the ones that the enemy tells you makes you a failure. You keep them hidden away because you feel like a fraud.
Then there are the scars that come as a result of someone you love. Those are hard to show as well, because they reflect poorly on someone else and you don't want others to look at that person as capable of causing scars.
But here's the real truth...
We ALL have scars. And we are ALL able to cause scars to others.
Some are small and barely noticeable. Some are large and red and jagged and painful to even look at.
A few days ago, I walked into a store behind a woman wearing shorts. One of her legs, around her calf, was profusely scared and mangled and much smaller than the other one. She had a slight limp. I found myself wondering what had happened at the same time I applauded her for her willingness to still wear shorts on a warm day, even though it exposed her pain and disfigurement to the world. I wondered if she thought, This is me, this is who I am, and I will not live in shame.
This weekend at a conference, Sheila Walsh said "Shame tells us we ARE something wrong."
I wondered if this scarred lady decided she was NOT something wrong as she put on her shorts that morning just like everyone else.
I wish I were that free with my hard and painful parts. What if we all were?
My pressing (and scary!) thought lately is that it has to start with someone. And I am someone. (GULP!)
Would I be that brave?
Would I have the courage to bare my scars to the world, knowing that some people will look kindly at me with compassion, but many others will snarl their lip in disgust and turn away, and some people will just ignore it because it makes them uncomfortable.
Being reminded of our weakness and frailty makes us uncomfortable. But it is also comforting to know that we are not alone in our messed up places. We are not the only ones with scars.
But guess what? Our scars do NOT make us weak!
Sometimes I think I am more afraid that if people see my scars, they will think I am weak and stupid and don't love God enough. Or they will think I am lying about my life. Maybe they will wonder what other scars I am still hiding? Maybe you are reading this and wondering what in the world kind of scars I have?
Why do we do that? Well, I think it's because we all keep our scars so well hidden. We especially keep the "bad" ones hidden.
What if...what if people stopped hiding their scars? Then it wouldn't be the strange thing to see people walking into stores with exposed scars. Perfection wouldn't be the norm. It would be normal to see people's battle scars. And we would all have more compassion for each other. We would react differently to someone else's hurt, because we see evidence of past hurts. We would encourage each other more.
We would be FOR each other.
This is hard for me. Because I like to look good. Who doesn't? Having skin cancer last year and having a huge scar on my face has been sort of a wake up call to how vain I am on my outward appearance. But what about how vain we are on our souls?
I think too many people think their soul is prettier than yours.
But we are all a big ol' scarred up mess of flesh.
What if we offered to show our scars first?
It would take courage.
Am I that courageous?
I don't know...
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