Being one who loves autumn and all its colour, I enjoy a drive almost anywhere this time of year; be it a long drive in the country or merely to the store for an errand, I like to look around at God’s beauty about me.
When you’re looking around so much, you’re bound to notice things.
It was during a drive the other week between the chapel and home when something caught my attention ~ but it was nothing autumnal specifically. I had merely read the bumper
sticker on the car in front of me while stopped at the light. In big cursive letters it read “Jesus Loves you” and the cockles of my heart were warmed. Upon further study of the sticker, I noticed it had a sub-line written in plainer and smaller letters which said “…but everyone else thinks you’re a loser”. Needless to say my cockles froze back up!
As the light turned green, I was left thinking through the statement on that sticker and found myself experiencing a few different emotions; as the initial funk and frustration at having read the sticker [and the various condemnations and judgements I passed upon the driver] began to subside I found a new sense of my heart warming again.
"Jesus loves you…everyone else thinks you're a loser". Even if this true of your life, while the intent of such a sticker is intended to put down the reader [and, inadvertently devalue Jesus] our value ought to be found in Jesus thoughts of us. Despite the “authorial intent”, it really is a good sticker: All that really matters is the fact that the sinless son of God would love you ~ and die for you ~ that’s incredible. He is the only one we would want to love us, and by living in his love, we will become loveable to others! So, who cares what the driver of that car thinks?!
While I didn’t see this particular sticker during my drive home that day, another one comes to mind which maybe you have seen in your travels: What about "if you can read this you're following too close" on the back of a car written really small? It is a tongue in cheek comment on the fact that we are to be considerate when driving and not tail-gate. I find the following encouragement from Paul to be implicit within such a bumper-sticker: "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others." Philippians 2. 3-4 (TNIV)
I hope you might be encouraged to look around you and find truth in unexpected places. If it is true, God is its author, and as His children in this culture, sometimes the truth can be blurred of hard to find, but it is there for those who work to pull it out! For more on this, I recommend Philip Yancey’s book Finding God in Unexpected Places. While he might not have a chapter on bumper stickers, you might be surprised where you find Him outside the walls of the church!
