Keep Imagining

I was reading Matthew's account of the woman who took a risk of faith.  You probably know her as "the woman with the issue of blood."  I've chosen to define her by her success and trust in God not the sores that lead her to Him. (It's like the accounts from Louisianna, where the whites were "scavenging" while the blacks were "looting")  And the church has a history of misogeny we need to chuck too so - She's the woman who took a risk of faith.

But she just touches Jesus ever so lightly, just brushes his coat, and is elementally changed. the sores heal.  But i wondered if she'll ever loose the scars that the undoubted shunning from the culture of that day left on her heart?  She was made well physically but had to work out the aftermath of "who she was" from the place of who she'd become.  Her "sores" had healed but there still would be scars.

 I was struck that there is a difference in the healing process - a differentiation between the scars and the sores.  Soon after any accident (or an "on purpose" for that matter) whichever way the violence or injury enters your life, there begins the recovery from it.  Perhaps it's an unkind or thoughtless word, maybe it's the hammer that crushed your finger, maybe people you thought were your friends prove themselves to be otherwise, maybe you were born hemophilic.

In any case there is impact, and from that impact a process of recovery.  Sometimes it is hard to determine which of our injuries are sores and which are scars.  Some of us get wounded so often in the same place, that what was easliy only a sore - becomes a scar.

Jesus gives us as much of himself as we care to ask for He draws as close as we will tolerate.  It is in that place that the sores heal and He teaches us the true nature of scarred selves.  He teaches us we are poor in spirit, marred and crippled. And it is only in Him that we have our strength.

So here's to risks of faith and scars and sores - may He heal you.