Kintsugi

Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing cracked or broken pottery with lacquer mixed with gold. The idea is that rather than try to hide or disguise past breakages, they are rather illuminated. We spend so much time and energy trying to hide or disguise the fact that we are broken. And if we have repented and come unto Christ and been forgiven and redeemed, then we want to disavow our former broken self. We were broken. We have been repaired. But God does not make us back just as we were. He makes us better. We can become more beautiful through our gleaming, golden scars than we could have ever imagined. Jesus Christ, in His perfected, resurrected body, did not hide the scars in His hands and in His feet and in His side. In fact, He invited all to come and feel the prints of the nails in His hands and feet. He was not ashamed of His scars. They are a beautiful reminder of the ultimate sacrifice that He made. Like the Japanese Kintsugi, Jesus’s scars gleam golden with the joy and the hope that is in the power of the Atonement and the Resurrection. If scars are good enough for the Savior, then they ought to be good enough for us. “But he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.” (Job 23:10). God knows what we’ve been through. He knows our struggles, our fears, the bitter, anguished moments of hopelessness and despair. But when our trial comes to an end, He will bind us back together with threads of gold and we shall gleam with Heaven’s light. I know that it is impossible to truly come unto the Savior without first being broken and then with all humility offering up our broken heart and contrite Spirit. And I know just as surely that Christ will repair the breaks in ous soul with the brilliant golden light of His love and we shall come forth as gold.