{"id":12533,"date":"2012-12-06T07:00:36","date_gmt":"2012-12-06T14:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/?p=12533"},"modified":"2015-11-16T11:59:19","modified_gmt":"2015-11-16T18:59:19","slug":"wounds-in-heaven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2012\/12\/06\/wounds-in-heaven\/","title":{"rendered":"Wounds in Heaven?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"facebook\" src=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/wounds-of-christ-300x223.jpg\" alt=\"wounds of christ\" width=\"300\" height=\"223\" \/>Today I&#8217;d like to talk about one of the songs from a recent album of my favourite contemporary Christian band, <a href=\"http:\/\/castingcrowns.com\/\">Casting Crowns<\/a>. The song is entitled\u00a0<span style=\"color: #000000\"><em>&#8220;Wedding Day&#8221;<\/em><\/span>\u00a0and describes the wedding feast of Heaven when Christ&#8217;s Bride, the Church, is finally presented to the Him:<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"860\" height=\"484\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/0MHnSau9bbI?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;start=182&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Towards the end of the song there&#8217;s a lyric which speaks of the scarred hands of Christ wiping away every tear:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\"><span style=\"color: #003300\"><em>When <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">the hand that bears the only scars<\/span> and heaven touch her face<br \/>\nAnd the last tears she&#8217;ll ever cried are finally wiped away<br \/>\nAnd the clouds roll back as He takes her hand and walks her through the gates<br \/>\nForever we will reign<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve spent quite a bit of time ruminating on this lyric. When I first heard this line I pondered: will Christ really be the only one with scars in Heaven? <em>(This is the sort of thing I think about while driving in the car&#8230;)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Many months ago, while\u00a0I was preparing the <a href=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/category\/faith\/sunday-lectionary\/\">Lectionary Notes<\/a>,\u00a0I came across the following quotation in <a title=\"Ch-ch-chain\u2026Chain of Fathers*\" href=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2011\/10\/03\/catena-aurea\/\">the Catena<\/a> from St. Augustine in his commentary on\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.biblegateway.com\/passage\/?search=John%2020:26-31&amp;version=NIV\">John 20:26-31<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\"><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"color: #000080\"><em>We are&#8230;afflicted with such love for the <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">blessed martyrs<\/span>, that we would wish in that kingdom to <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">see on their bodies the marks of those wounds<\/span> which they have borne for Christ&#8217;s sake. And p<span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">erhaps we shall see them<\/span>; for they will not have deformity, but dignity, and, though on the body, shine forth not with bodily, but with <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">spiritual beauty<\/span>&#8230;\u00a0<\/em><em>For though all the <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">blemishes of the body shall then be no more<\/span>, yet the <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">evidences of virtue are not to be called blemishes<\/span>.<\/em><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000080\"> &#8211; St. Augustine,<\/span> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.newadvent.org\/fathers\/120122.htm\" target=\"_blank\">City of God, Book XXII, Chapter 19<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p>As much as I love Casting Crowns, I really prefer St. Augustine&#8217;s thoughts on this matter. If Christ&#8217;s wounds are preserved in Heaven, why should the wounds of His Body, the Church, not also remain in some fashion? But whereas on earth these wounds were sources of pain, in Heaven they will shine forth with glory!<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>I would suggest that we&#8217;re solidly in the realms of theological speculation here, but I&#8217;m really interested in your thoughts on this matter: Will Christ&#8217;s scars be the only ones in Heaven?\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today I&#8217;d like to talk about one of the songs from a recent album of my favourite contemporary Christian band, Casting Crowns. The song is entitled\u00a0&#8220;Wedding Day&#8221;\u00a0and describes the wedding feast of Heaven when Christ&#8217;s Bride, the Church, is finally presented to the Him: Towards the end of the song there&#8217;s a lyric which speaks of the scarred hands of<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[315,2969,1049,143,1856,1015],"class_list":["post-12533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith","tag-casting-crowns","tag-featured","tag-heaven","tag-st-augustine","tag-wedding-day","tag-wounds"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12533"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59953,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12533\/revisions\/59953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}