Jesus wasn't there

You see some interesting things and people when you ride public transportation. Some make me laugh, some make me sad, some make me want to keep a good distance.

Yesterday, I rode the bus a considerable amount. This blog is gonna tell about the people who made me smile on my way from work.

There was a guy who came on the bus talking on the phone with his mom, his friend accompanying him. The guy was telling his mom that he had changed and stopped drinking alcohol altogether. He passed the phone over to his friend so his friend could tell his mom about how he had pulled a complete 180 and was a different son than how he used to be. When the guy got his phone back he asked his mom to continue to keep in her prayers. Really that was the only thing I heard him say that would suggest that it was God that turned his life around.

But I saw something else that suggested it, something that I'd never seen before. He had a tattoo of three crosses on his left arm. I've seen tattoos of various crosses and crucifixes, some standing alone as Jesus' cross, some including the guilty thieves.

So with this tattoo, there was nothing eye-catching about the fact that there were 3 crosses, none of them with people on them. The thing that caught my eye was the fact that Jesus was very visibly absent from the middle cross. It showed the outline of the Savior, almost to show that Christ was indeed on this cross, but no longer is. He got off. He was buried. He went to hell. He came back. He rose. He lives in our hearts now. The cross was a temporary holding place for Him.

I just thought that was awesome. This guy knew that Jesus' absence from the cross was significant in changing his life, and he put it on his arm to tell the world.