The Beauty of Scars

I’m told that, when I was younger than my remembering, I fell, knocked over a catsup bottle, and landed on its shards. I carry the crescent-shaped scar on my elbow to this day. I can’t imagine my body without it; it’s become a part of who I am.

Yet I’d always had a notion that emotional or spiritual healing would leave me looking good as new, with baby-fresh skin and a just-bathed, no-more-tears innocence. It hasn’t been like that.

I don’t think it’s in the nature of the universe to work on the “Etch-A-Sketch” principle. We can’t give ourselves a shake and erase scars imprinted on our souls. Creation’s just too real to be undone.

Instead, we can choose to let our scars weave their way into creation’s fabric—often by accompanying another: one with fresher, rawer scars. When we do, we find in our scars a new kind of beauty: the beauty of Jacob’s limp and of Jesus’ wrists and side.

What is your experience of scars? Have you found beauty in them?