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A while ago, one of my blog friends sent me an inspiring email. It was one of those slideshows accompanied by music, encouraging statements, and words of wisdom. I liked it. In fact, it was one of the few pass-along emails that I might pass along. There was one statement in this presentation, however, that I disagree with, and I related that to my friend. It stated, “Time heals everything. Give time, time.”
I wish time did heal everything, but it doesn’t. It is a lie and gives us false hope. It may cause us to wonder if we are flawed or deficient somehow because we struggle getting through our grief for what seems to be a long time, perhaps longer than is expected for psychologically “normal” people.
I think we all know by now that different people process grief in different ways. Laurie and I have watched crime documentaries where hardened police officers still tear up when they recount a murder case long past, or soldiers weep over the loss of a buddy during war time. I have experienced this in my life. The devastation caused by the loss of my mother from colon cancer healed over time, but still, occasionally, I will grieve over her death when I remember her. These experiences are common among us weak human beings. We love, and because we love, we will grieve when we lose loved ones who have passed away. The deeper the love, the deeper the wound, and the more grievous the scar. But the scar is, because we loved so deeply, a good scar.
However, God plus time does heal everything. We are told that in God’s kingdom, we will mourn no more.
“…and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4).1
Jesus will be the one ministering to our afflictions then as he does now, and His wounds will still be visible. After Philip doubted the fellow disciples’ report of the appearance of Jesus, proving He had indeed risen from the dead, Jesus walked through a wall of the room in which they had gathered. This is the account of that event:
“After eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors having been shut, and stood in their midst and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ Then He said to Thomas, ‘Reach here with your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand and put it into My side; and do not be unbelieving, but believing.’ Thomas answered and said to Him, ‘My Lord and my God!’” (John 20:26–28).
His wounds are obviously different than ours. We are healed—saved—because of them.
“…and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed” (1 Peter 2:24).
But I wonder if those of us who have suffered through physical injuries for the sake of His name will bear the marks of those wounds in heaven, too. This, of course, is speculation.
There may be respected scars in heaven, and many believers may bear them. However, the most important among them will be the ones borne by the Creator of all things. The scars that Jesus bears are deep but good and worthy scars because He loves us so deeply. I am grateful—and will be for eternity—for that kind of love. I pray that I can love, at least in some measure, as He does and share in His suffering.
Paul beautifully wrote, “…that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead” (Philippians 3:10–11).
Amen. According to Your will, Father.
1 All Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible: 1995 update. (1995). La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation.
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