lately, as you can see on my facebook page and profile pic, I’ve been fascinated with all of these old school “Jesus Saves” pictures. Most of the time when I see one of these signs, my mind immediately goes to some urban, dowtown area that is teeming with the down-and-outers… the homeless and the hopeless. I can picture one of these neon crosses lit above a door to a union gospel mission… a place where one of these down-and-outers can step in out of the cold and rain and get a meal and hear the gospel. I can picture the scene, I can smell the smells, and I can feel the anguish of men and women who wonder how their lives ever came to this point.
perhaps that’s what I love about these old school “Jesus Saves” signs. regardless of our socio-economic status… regardless of our story… regardless of our dependence on drugs or alcohol, the Bible says we’re all “down-and-outers.” we’re about as far down as we can go, if we picture God as being “up” (and He’s really all around… theologians call it omni-presence). we’re all about as far out as we can get. and yet, here is God with flesh, Jesus Christ, the God Man, who comes to the down-and-outers, who comes down and goes far out, and who rescues us from ourselves, from each other, and from a broken world.
I need these old school signs to remind me that my Jesus truly does save. one of the comments on my “Jesus Saves” album was a humorous “Jesus also spends.” there’s a beautiful truth there… because Jesus spent His life on that cross absorbing and exhausting the rightful and holy wrath of God due us, Jesus saves. so Jesus truly does spend and save. I love and need these “Jesus Saves” signs shining through the darkness to remind me that the Light of the World is here and I don’t have to live in the darkness any longer.
