August 16, 2026
Most of us come into the world without scars. Some face birth problems leading to surgery, but we mostly skip into childhood with only skinned knees, scrapes, and little injuries. Like my eyebrow scar from colliding with a dog bowl when I tripped while running from a bee. But there can also be wounds from real trauma. The photo is of my, my dad’s, and my grandfather’s military dog tags. Granddad’s round ones from WWI are at the bottom. Luckily, we all survived our wartime service. Only my grandfather saw combat.
Some wounds are not visible, inner ones, sustained from life experiences. I have recovered from the trauma of being in a sniper mass shooting in college 60 years ago. We know of combat veterans who still struggle from their wartime traumas, and others who also deal with post-traumatic stress disorder, PTSD. Whether from accidents, crime, disaster, family conflict, or serious health issues, we deal as best we can with our own inner scars. But it helps to share our residual fear, dismay, and grief with someone. It may be with family, friends, or a trained counselor.
We all have scars, don’t we? I listened to those of a lady displaced from her homeland in Ukraine. People from other countries can carry awful stories of why they left or maybe of being rejected here. I wrote in 2024 of Afghan refugee kids I met and how I felt sympathy for their plight of being dropped into a strange land, culture, and unfamiliar religious beliefs. I did not speak their language, so I bought them maps of their new home in Arizona. It was not just a Christian ethic for me to help; it was a human responsibility. They, like the rest of us, have emotional scars. I could help a bit, but God can heal. He can also heal those scars you may have. A wonderful aspect of being in a loving church, such as St. Paul’s, is that we can find sympathetic listeners who perhaps can relate and help us heal.
