Saving Jesus

 One day, driving in my car, I saved Jesus.   I recall it being a Thursday as that was trash day in my neighborhood.  As I drove up the road I saw it:  Jesus, perfectly framed in a 16x24 poster, sitting by the trash.  The face looked up at me with the traditional brown eyes and long wavy hair. A slight halo- glow circled his face filled with love. His red sash gleamed in the sunlight.  He sat between two bags of trash.

My heart leaped.  Several emotions jumped through me, from anger to sadness to curiosity.  After all, who would throw away Jesus?

I stopped my car mid-street, jumped out and grabbed Jesus.  I threw Him (as reverently as I could) into the trunk and went on my way.  I prayed no one saw me-- was this considered theft?  I felt very strange:  We don't save Jesus, it's Jesus who saves us! Right?  I was actually embarrassed for Jesus;  He is the King of Kings, seated at the right hand of God!  This isn't the place for him.....I decided I was the one sent to save him from the dumpish display of His glory.  Poor Jesus!

I still have that picture; it's in my storage room at my house.  I have never decided on what to do with it, so I keep it safe as a priceless painting in a museum vault.

The picture's owner and history still baffles me.  Yet when I think about it, it really isn't so strange to see Jesus by the trash.  People every day put him out to the curb of their hearts.  They see Him in the revelation of nature's design, a cross on a church, seeing a Bible in a hotel, hearing a sermon.  They see a cross on a neighbor's neck and a nativity scene at Christmas.  Yet they respond, "No thank you, Jesus.  I'm just fine without you."  They summarily put Him to the street on trash day, knowing that He will be rudely collected by a truck and thrown on the trash heap of Spotsylvania County.  Just as the Jews said to Jesus, "Take him away!", mankind says the same thing: "Take him away! To the dump!"

Even Christian disciples have put Jesus to the curb.  In John 6:66, Jesus is preaching a hard message.  The Bible tells us that,  "from that moment many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with Him."   Hard times, disappointments, failures, death of a loved one, these all push Jesus to the edge of the lawn.  They hope that once out of sight, Jesus will be out of mind. Jesus keeps looking up in the painting, eyes full of love.

Imagine Jesus, assigned with black banana peels, old newspapers, smelly bottles.  The Prince of Heaven, leaning up a filthy can, awaiting the trash collector's visit. The One who made the wildflowers and the mountain peaks, the frost on a pumpkin and the immeasurable stars, resides with rats and decay.

It's really not too far off-course from truth.  Jesus did exactly that.  2,000 years ago.

Jesus, the perfect Lamb, the Ancient of Days, the Word of God, became the rubbish of man.  Taking on our sin, he was despised and rejected.  He was made filth in his Father's eyes.  He was thrown with the trash-people of Jerusalem:  Barabbas and two thieves who earned execution.  He died on the dung hill of society --- drinking our cup of wrath, so we could someday cling to His cross and be saved. 

And now, Jesus is still found in trash heaps.  Jesus is found in drug houses, prisons, prostitution halls and where the poor live in squalor.  Jesus said in Matthew 25:36, "I was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me.  I was in prison and you came to me."  Jesus is wherever brokenness and death thrive.  Jesus waits to pour His grace and forgiveness in every heart that is black with sin.  Jesus waits with the trash, calling for all to come to Him and bear His yoke which is easy and light.  Jesus says, "Come unto me!"

Don't think that sinful trash heaps don't live in suburban homes, mansions and the finest hotels of the world.  Rich and poor alike are born into sin's poverty with no ability to save themselves.  People may have a clean-looking life, but don't let that fool you.  They all need Jesus.  They are in trash too. We all are born citizens of Satan's junkyard existence. We need someone to save us from the trash furnace to come ---- the arms of Jesus.  

Seeing Jesus by the trash heap taught me that Jesus will always be found in the lowly places in our world.  I need to be willing to be His hands and feet, to minister where the world is repelled.   I need to see everyone as needing the cleansing blood of Jesus, which covers all sin, past, present, and future. I need not be embarrassed to sit next to trash bags and broken things.
Thank you, Jesus, for entering the trash heap for me. 
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  I didn't really save Jesus that day;  He captured me again with a beautiful message that I would never forget.

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