I grew up in the woods of the Ozarks in Southern Missouri. A tree lives with roots planted in the earth and limbs lifted toward the heavens. I too am trying to grow deep roots while lifting my hands toward God.

Friday, July 20, 2007

Reunions, Scabs and Scars.

Almost two months have passed since my last blog, which was actually written in June, 2005 but never posted.

It seems like I have been living my life in a car most of the summer. I just got back from Tennessee today and leave for Milwaukee in the morning. Sometime in between I had better do some laundry. I already checked my tomatoes.....still green, but getting bigger. I might pick one and fry it up.

Colleen and I was in TN attending a retreat at a resort on Kentucky Lake. This little gathering is quite unusual in that there is about 150 of us that annually make the trek for three days of fellowship, sharing, worship, food and fun. Jerry Jones started it 21 years ago and except for a few years spent in bleachers watching our children play some sport we haven't missed very many. We have forged some wonderful relationships during this time-relationships that have endured and blessed us in good times and bad and rescued us on those occasions when my sin left us and others on the precipice of destruction.

There is a very loose agenda to our time together. We pray. We sing (with Jerome Williams and Keith Lancaster leading we simply cannot stop). People share pain and joy. Some have lost someone close to them. Other's have screwed up their lives and come because they have no place left to go. Many have had wonderful years and come to celebrate. It doesn't matter, the microphone is open to all, and we rejoice and mourn appropriately. Acappella sings one night and the last night is a hilarious talent (or lack thereof) night. Jerry tells the same jokes, but we still cannot help but laugh. I treasure it because I always get to spend time with a man who is truly my Father in the faith, Albert Lemmons. I love him and his wife, Patsy dearly. They have a remarkable ministry of prayer and healing.

Brandon came for the last day and took Colleen back to Arkansas with him. I think she and Kim (Brandon's fiance') had some wedding planning to do.

That left me with six hours in the car to reflect. I listened to music. I prayed. More music. More prayer. I thought about how quickly 21 years had past. My life is not where I thought it would be. I am not doing what I thought I would be doing. I am not sure about my future and not real happy about the past. I have done some good things and some things I thought I would never do. The only real constant has been God, who has shown me unfailing love when I was nothing but unloving failure. I do know one thing: I love Jesus the Messiah more at this point than I ever have. He has rescued me from me and brought healing to those I love. He kept me alive.
I have scars-mostly self-inflicted ones. But as Albert pointed out, a scar is something to be thankful for, because it means the wound is healed.

I thought about that and I thought about the difference between a scar and scab. A scab can still be picked, it can still be painful, still bleed, still get infected and get worse. The more you pick at it the bigger the scar it leaves. A scab is necessary, it is part of the process of healing but it is not the final product. Only when there is a scar is one healed.

Find a scar on your body. I bet you can remember exactly how you got it. I have one from a hunting accident, a couple from motorcycles, some from surgeries, etc, etc. Each has a story, some pretty ridiculous. Imagine though having a scab for ten years....and telling people how you got it and why you keep picking it off. Who would do that? The body heals itself when it learns to protect the scab until there is a scar. As the body of Christ, do we protect our scabs or do we keep picking at them?

I am thankful for my scars. Some are really ugly. Some embarrass me and I want to hide them, but they serve as reminders to live obediently before God and try my best to never hurt anyone, including myself, again.

Amazingly, my God is scarred too. But, for the life of me, he cannot remember who gave them to him.