I was having a conversation with my boss the other day and they were sharing how a mother of three wanted to get surgery to reverse the affects of how her body had changed through the pregnacies. Putting the debate on plastic surgery aside look deeper into this with me. Think about women who have survived breast cancer, men who have come through a war, individuals who have been abused. How often we seek to conceal an experience in our lives so that we may be excepted as the "norm". Why do we seek to conceal? We long to not show our "flawed" state of self. So often life experiences that should be used to bring healing to others we want to bundle up and nurture in our arms.
What if we wore these scars proudly? Scars externally and internally show that we have been through a battle and made it out on the other side. This is not a fatalistic approach of saying that we should live in the depths of our wounds, but that by sharing we may be a tangible healing balm to those who have been wounded. The discussion here is not whether these things are "beautiful" or not, but that they are. Shouldn't these life experiences be something to share, embrace, celebrate? So often we see the irregular as something to be fixed. Can we embrace the diversity in which we have been given?
Jesus was a man of sheer vulnerability and embraced the life in which he was given. Many wanted to "fix" the situation when Jesus declared that he would be crucified, but he knew the beginning from the end. I desire to live a life with arms flung wide open saying "Here I am flawed, but inviting, open, life giving." A rose in full bloom is most fragrant, but if a rose were to stay closed what would we be able to enjoy about it?
5 comments:
"What's in a name? that which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet..." :)
This resonates with me Layne. I am learning to embrace my own weaknesses and scars. It is a challenge for me because our culture focuses on the "beautiful" and those who are successful (defined by who I do not know) and I seem to want to be viewed in a way that would be attractive to others.
As women (for example) we are commended when we have lost weight, are emotionally stable, successful, and "put together". If we are found lacking we often feel that we will never measure up to the expectations of others and therefore miss out on relationships, opportunities, acceptance and the like. Yet I find when I am around those who share their wounds and the areas where they don't "measure up", they are much more attractive to me because they are people who you really get to know intimately, people you can rest in, enjoy and learn from. They are inviting and have much wisdom to give because of their experiences. There is a treasure they have to offer to us because the pain and the scars they share can produce a beauty of character, just as a pearl is only produced through much pressure and time.
Thank you Layne for an exceptional blog, and for reminding us that our wounds can be the instruments of healing in the lives of others. For we who have been afflicted will find comfort and thus be a comfort to the afflicted.
I love that God's chosen incarnate vessel was a human body with all its frailties and limitations. Jesus definitely did not feel the need to hide his true appearance. I love the words of Isaiah:
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. (Isaiah 53)
I think we would be naive to think that Jesus did not feel pain or experience traumatic moments, even before his crucifixion.
I also love when Paul wrote that "we hold this treasure in jars of clay, in order to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from ourselves."
I suppose that whatever highlights our "clay-ness" just offers God all the more opportunity to receive the glory as people see the treasure that he's put inside us.
Thank you for your thoughts :)
so i'm late in remarking on this blog but remark i shall.
i think a lot about this subject for three reasons:
two are quite personal, and one is just an opinion i have.
so i really despise the concept of plastic surgery....of medicine capitalizing on the insecurities of people everywhere....striving for some contrived perfection that doesn't even exist.
but i've always loved the idea of reconstructive surgery. giving someone back dignity, a little peace, where the horrors of the past don't stare them in the face everytime they brush their teeth.
maybe the latter is important to me because the strength to let those scars be a testament and not a flashback is not always present in people in the same degree.
my mum was burned in a house fire when i was 11. 3rd degree burns on her hands, 2nd degree burns on her neck, 1st degree burns on her face, and a voice that once was so soft, that now sounds like she's perpetually getting over a cold.
her hands were beautiful. and still are to me. mainly because they do the same things they used to do: touch with love, brush my hair, help others, cook meals.
but i often wonder what she thinks when she looks at them. i feel it could occasionally get exhausting. she decided against skin grafts to make them "normal". ...but i don't know if i would have.
the third reason....well that's for a rainy day. or some coffee.
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