...the toll of love

Crown him the Lord of love! Behold His hands and side,

Rich wounds, yet visible above, in beauty glorified;

no angels in the sky can fully bear the sight,

but downward bend their burning eyes at mysteries so bright.

---Matthew Bridges, 1851

There is a country song that includes the line, “…you ain’t lived till you got scars.” I think there is a lot of truth in the statement. My daughter Abby’s knee will always show the scars of a childhood fall from the “high monkey bars” and a couple of inelegant adolescent stair descents. Sarah’s forehead will always have a Harry Potter-esque ‘lightning bolt’ mark to remind her of the hutch at the bottom of the stairs at Grandma’s in Columbus. Any mom will tell of scars related to birthing, then raising, children --- scars both physical and emotional. Life takes its toll on us all.

And life took its toll on Jesus. When I read this hymn, I am struck by the thought that the Jesus glorified in heaven, present with the angels, still bears the scars of a real life. The kinds of scars we all carry--of injury and discouragement, of betrayal and disappointment, of rejection and indifference—if we walk the world long enough, earnestly enough. No air-brushed, cleaned-up, sanitized version of Jesus reigns in heaven. The Lord of love, mystery of mysteries, still bears the marks of his sacrifice on his glorified body.

You ain’t lived till you got scars.