You Can Look at a Scar

At the end of last year, I reflected upon the preceedings months and described some of the God-moments of 2008. For me, these are the moments in which our Heavenly Father reveals himself in ways that frankly are hard to explain. But nevertheless, I am grateful, because these are reminders that He is near and loves us.

I had another one of those God-moments today. Today, while we were taking photos of the girls’ hands for the My Refuge House holiday greeting cards, our resident, Sheri,* (real name witheld) laughingly resisted and tried to hide the scars lining her right wrist. These were physical expressions of deep emotional pain. Sheri is just one of the few girls here at MRH who have a history of self-injury and suicidal attempts. I told Sheri that she did not have to hide her scars or be embarrassed. I told her we were instead going to focus on what was written on the palm of her hand - the words “LOVE.” In that moment, I was reminded of Someone else’s scars which happen to spell out the same word.

I share with you some words from my colleague, Crystal Sprague, who is an Aftercare Fellow at IJM Cebu and is a great help with me in training our staff to better care for our girls.

"You can look at a scar and see hurt, or you can look at a scar and see healing" -Sheri Reynolds

Indeed, you can look at a scar and see -