 Wounded Years ago, I heard a sermon that gave me a lifetime worth of insights. The preacher was the former President of L.I.F.E. Bible College, Dick Scott. He entitled his message, "Scars, Wounds and Infections." Keeping with the theme of the series of messages I am bringing this summer, "Come to Your Senses," we come to one of the largest, if not the largest organ of the human body. No, it’s not the heart, or the brain, or the liver. It’s the skin. When I think of the skin, I think of something a man said to me when I began in the ministry. He said to be a pastor, "You need the brain of a scholar, the heart of a lion, and the hide of a rhinoceros!" We refer to ultra sensitive people as being "thin skinned." We refer to emotionally hardened individuals as being "calloused." It is by our skin that we feel things. It is the skin that has so many nerve endings that we feel the warmth of a tender touch. It is also the skin that screams in pain when we are wounded. In fact the word trauma comes from the Greek Word, "Traumatidzo," which means a wound. What Dr. Scott preached on so eloquently was the fact that we are all going to get wounded. What we do with the wounds is the key to whether we have an open wound, a scar, or an infection. Having worked for over a year in a physical therapy clinic back in Seminary, I can tell you that how wounds are cared for makes an enormous difference. Some people heal and others have a lifetime of painful consequences. A scar is clearly visible. It doesn’t have to be a debilitating factor. An open wound is a potentially life-threatening thing. If the wound is contaminated, it can lead to infection. Some infections can lie dormant for a while and then resurface, only to cause more damage. A staph infection is like that. A routine cut on the finger can lead to a major life-threatening situation, if a staph infection has taken hold in your body. So this morning I want to look at the health of our spiritual skins. As I already mentioned, we are all going to be wounded, some more gravely than others. We have all been hurt, some by the people closest to us. It is what we do with our wounds and our hurts that matters most. I vividly remember watching a drama unfold a number of years ago. A little boy in our neighborhood fell off his bike. He scraped his arm on the pavement. He cried a little bit and then stopped. He left the bike and ran to his home. As soon as he got to the driveway, he suddenly held the wounded wing and began to wail. He was home and he knew who could "make it better." Before we leave today, I pray that we will do the same--take our wounds to the only One who can make us better. Pastor Jim |
