Psalm 65
“…your wagon tracks overflow with richness” (Psalm 65:11b)
There’s something truly hopeful in this partial line from Psalm 65.
A wagon track is a rut. It is the oft-abused, frequently driven over, grooved bruise on the earth. It’s where water can pool and stagnate, allowing mosquitos to flourish and scum to accumulate. It doesn’t have any meaning in itself; it’s just the thing people use when they have a place they desire to go to.
Our souls – by that, I mean our hearts, minds, emotional lives – have plenty of wagon tracks. It’s the critical voice you use with yourself when you make a mistake. It’s the mocking voice you hear when you see a part of yourself you don’t like. It’s the rejection that still stings, even after 40 years. These are the wagon tracks of your life.
But then look! Look and see what God does with those places! Our wagon tracks “overflow with richness.” They are beautiful places, bountiful places, rich resources.
Friends, because Jesus was raised in a bodily resurrection and because He ascended to heaven in bodily form, this means He carries with Him the scars of His crucifixion. His hands and feet have these circular pock marks where nails once penetrated and that scar tissue now covers. His side has this nasty slice, yet another scar. If you get close enough to His face, you can see faint little lines and dots of scar tissue all around his head where once a crown of thorns rested. These elements are with Him still – even in His resurrected, glorified body.
Why does Jesus’ perfect, resurrected body still have scars? Wouldn’t we assume those would disappear when He was raised in glory? No, we wouldn’t and that because “your wagon tracks overflow with richness.”
The scars on your body and your soul are not blemishes to be covered up or ignored because these are places where God’s richness shows through. Amen.
