We already had six children when we learned we would be having another. The line-up was boy-boy-girl, boy-boy-girl. This pattern led us to believe we’d have another boy, but I had to talk myself out of wanting a girl to partner with Louisa, who would be only 18 months when the new baby arrived.

But as every mother-to-be knows, a pregnancy quickly bonds mommy to unborn baby, and the sex didn’t really matter. But when I began bleeding at 11 weeks along, I knew we were miscarrying the baby.

It was a sad loss, but our lives were busy and full. I didn’t have time to mourn when it happened, but when that baby’s original due date arrived six months later, I found myself dissolving in grief over our loss. Not until heaven would we know who that was, and I had trouble shaking off the sadness and drying up the tears.

Later that very day, though, on the baby’s actual due date, I learned I was pregnant again! God’s timing was spectacular as always, and knowledge of another little one coming to join our family quickly overwhelmed my sorrow over the miscarriage. The weeks ticked off without a hitch, and when I was eight months along, we had an ultrasound test.

I remember that day well. Because sonography was brand new, Nate and I decided to take our three oldest kids to the doctor’s office to watch the monitor with us and appreciate a glimpse of their new brother or sister a month before the birth. Nels, Lars and Linnea were 17, 15 and 13, old enough to be genuinely grateful for their younger siblings.

When we learned during the ultrasound we’d be having another girl, Linnea and I whooped with delight. God had rearranged the boy-girl pattern, giving me the desire of my heart, which was to balance our boy-heavy family with another girl. That feminine blessing turned out to be Birgitta Mary, named after the first Swedish queen and my sister.

Today Birgitta celebrated her 20^th birthday, that universal birthday that says farewell to the teenage years. It was a similar farewell for me today, having had one or more teenagers in the house for 24 years straight. Birgitta has been a daughter of whom we’ve been proud all the way along. She’s a talented artist, journalist, violinist, dancer, singer and song-writer. She’s a list-maker and a girl who plans for her future. She’s organized and is a champion at setting a goal and reaching for it.

Organizing a “gap year” after high school graduation, Birgitta has been rooming with Louisa in Chicago, both of them anxious for the experience of living and working in a big city. But she’s ready to move on and has chosen to begin college life at a Big Ten university in the fall, changing her focus toward acquiring a degree or two, and one day working in the relatively new field of art therapy.

I was nearly 45 years old when Birgitta was born, and I’ve often referred to her as “the frosting on our family cake.” From her early years as the family “OK Girl” (nicknamed because of her agreeable disposition) to her current years of becoming my friend, she’s been a sweet blessing all the way along. If her father had been at her party today, he would have been singing her praises.

God sure was good to us on June 18, 1990.

“Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity. Be diligent in these matters. Give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress.” (1 Timothy 4:12, 15)

Being a funeral director must be difficult, every client a grief-stricken one. But what about being an embalmer, every client a deceased one?

I remember a thought-provoking movie from 1991 called “My Girl.”  One of the lead characters (played by Jamie Lee Curtis) was a professional cosmetologist who took a job preparing dead bodies for their final appearance in the casket. Although the movie had an interesting storyline, the most thought-provoking thing about it was wondering how hard it would be to do the hair and makeup of someone who’d already died. Linked with that job is a question that’s been rumbling around in my head for years. Do people working on the bodies notice scars?

Certain scars are easy to identify: a Cesarean section, an appendectomy, a hernia, open heart surgery. But what about the others? Do embalmers try to guess? Do they talk together about unusual scars? And more importantly, do they feel respect for the one who has borne them?

Everybody could tell tales of trauma linked to their scars. It seems probable the more scars a person has, the deeper the character of that life, a phenomenon of the strange relationship between outer hardship and inner growth. If we had our way, we’d skip scars altogether, since each one translates to an experience of personal pain.

Some people willingly endure pain now, for a perk later: piercings, tattoos, corrective surgery. Nate was eager to go under the knife when the orthopedic surgeon told him his back pain would decrease after he healed.

But when I think of willingly undergoing pain deep enough to leave a scar without any perks afterwards, the chief example is Christ Jesus. His scars were many – both hands, both feet, his side, his brow, and all over his lacerated body – yet he agreed to every bit of it ahead of time, for our benefit and not his own.

I’m sure when we get to heaven, all of us will still have our scars, because Jesus still had his when he appeared to the disciples in his resurrected body. He showed them his healed wounds and invited them to touch his scars. In this life we think of scars as ugly deformities, but in that new world, I believe scars will be considered the most beautiful thing about us. Certainly the scars of Jesus will be supremely meaningful to us throughout eternity, because without the voluntary suffering that caused them, we wouldn’t be in heaven.

I think also of emotional scars, the kind no coroner or embalmer can see. Scars on our skin are an indication that physical healing has already taken place. Scar tissue is actually stronger than uninjured tissue and resists future damage better.  But emotional wounds hidden deep within us often heal slower and sometimes don’t heal at all. Was Jesus emotionally wounded? After reading Luke 22, the only feasible answer is “yes”.

Surely his emotional scars were healed after his resurrection, just as his physical wounds were. But what about the rest of us and the emotional wounds that continue to fester within us here on earth? In the next world, will they be healed, too?

My guess is they’ll be transformed… into beautiful scars.

“[Thomas] said… ‘Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it.’ Then [Jesus] said…‘Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.’” (John 20:25b,27)