“One of the reasons why I feel millennials are leaving the Church is because we showed them our scriptures without showing them our scars.” Kirk Franklin
I totally agree with Brother Kirk. What makes us as Christians, those who believe in Jesus, think that we can draw others to the kingdom without doing as Jesus did when he shared his wounds and scars with the disciples. When Jesus appeared to the disciples they still don’t get it. The disciples are with Jesus and they still didn’t get it. They couldn’t get that Jesus was really with them. They didn’t get that he was not a ghost. So, to settle their fears and doubts He told them to look at his hands and feet and see that it was Him. Touch me and see he said. I wonder how many times in our lives we invite others as Jesus did into moments of intimacy like this. Moments when we fully allow people to see who we are as flawed, scared and wounded creatures.
I would like to share one of my God Stories with you about just a moment like that. I was headed to class at seminary. I was late as I had served on the chapel team that morning. I badly needed a cup of tea and since I was already late I made the choice to go to the coffee shop on campus. It just so happened that one of my friends was working. Now I had known her since 2012. We first met at a discernment retreat and had reconnected when we got to the seminary. Over the three years in seminary we have had opportunities to spend a great deal of time together. Times of laughter and times of tears. Times of anxiety and times of joy. This day she shared with me that I was going to be the inspiration for her sermon the next Sunday. I was shocked and humbled.
As we continued to talk she said that the reason for this was that while at seminary I had been an example of one who shared my wounds with her. That in moments of vulnerability, I had allowed her to place her hand in my wounded hand and share in the intimacy of my wounds. Just as Jesus offered the wounds to our brother disciples.
We were both moved to tears and shared a deep and moving embrace. I realized in that moment that I had been truly seen by my friend. As I held that embrace with my dear sister friend I began to wonder if this was the key to pure, real and full reconciliation with our selves, with others and God.
Just as the disciples are with Jesus and they truly see him that was what was happening with my friend. Just as they were with a real and fleshy Jesus, my friend saw me in the flesh. Not as some far off mystery of a person.
Jesus is calling us to offer the gift of our wounds and scars as he did. He offered His not as mere proof that he is Jesus but to allow the disciples, even Peter who had denied him, an opportunity to be reconciled to Him in the intimacy of seeing Him and the touching of His wounds. The wounds that bring about healing and bring us to truly see and be seen by God. That is what we are called to do in order to bring people to the kingdom.
These wounds that we share and that Jesus shares eventually turn into scars. Jesus is not ashamed of those scars and we should not be either. He wears them as adornments of his love for us. They are not marks of shame to him but striking evidence of his love, of his sacrifice, of his victory on our behalf. The scars that Jesus carries are not just his, but they are ours too.
Jesus kept the scars so that we would know him by his scars. He didn’t have to keep his scars. He could have been healed and made new, but he chose to keep the scars to serve as reminder to us that there was a cross and there was a tomb. Jesus knew as humans we would like the disciples fear and doubt and that his scars would be needed to bring us comfort in knowing who he was. We carry our scars as a reminder that we have a God Story to tell that that in that story are stepping stones for others to reach the kingdom of God.
The scars say to us “I am the same Jesus.” And our scars tell us who we are and whose we are. They are unique and special to us and give us a portion of our identity. Just as Jesus’ scars allowed the disciples to see His true identity. This identity tells the disciples that he is truly alive. Our scars tell us that we are truly alive and lets others know that we have lived through some tough stuff but God has sustained us and He can do the same for them.
Jesus’ scars say Death has not won. Jesus’ scars are his battle wounds that give us freedom. His scars are scars of victory. Just as Jesus our scars show that we too have won and that our wounds give us freedom to be who we truly are and to be seen by others. With the scars he reminded the disciples that the same Jesus that rose from that tomb was the same Jesus that had suffered and died on the cross. The scars where undeniable proof that Jesus who had died was now alive and allows us to sing:
I’ve just seen Jesus I tell you he’s alive
I’ve just seen Jesus Our Precious Lord alive
And I knew, he really saw me too As if till now, I’d never lived
All that I’d done before Won’t matter anymore
I’ve just seen Jesus And I’ll never be the same again
Brothers and sisters know and see the nail-scarred Savior. The one who is alive. Our Precious Lord Jesus who invites us to look at and touch His wounds and scars. May we truly allow others to see our wounds and scars and may we truly see the wounds and scars of our brothers and sisters and really be seen as Jesus sees us, perfectly wounded, perfectly scared, perfectly flawed, perfectly loved and perfectly reconciled to God because of the wounds and scars of our living savior. Those who follow us long for us to offer our scared hands, our sides and our feet so that they can see the goodness of God and know that Jesus is real and longs for them with all their wounds and scars to be part of the Kingdom.
REV. MAR 