The Silhouette

A Story of the Cross

My eyes gazed out the window that early morning to see the sun spreading across the horizon like a painter's brush sweeping across a fresh canvas. As my eyes scanned the rolling hills they soon became fixed on a silhouette of a man hanging on a ragged tree. Soon I was beneath that tree.

I stared upward at his torn, frail body as the crowd cried words of hatred. His body appeared pale and lifeless and his head hung limply between his shoulders. The cloth around his waist had become stained with blood. I saw the blood dripping from the wounds where the thorns and nails had pierced his flesh. With each breath that he drew, the crowd became more angry and insulting.

"Hey, Jesus," a man cried, "Why don't you call your angels?" The crowd jeered with mocking laughter. "Why, aren't you the Son of God?"

I saw the pain revealed in his eyes as he looked toward Heaven. He had no hate for this man, nor for the others. He only loved them, somehow.

I, too, had come to mock this stranger! I had heard that he claimed to be the Son of God! Think of it, the Son of God! Yet somehow as I looked into his eyes, I felt he knew the ugliness of my life, and he loved me anyway! He possessed a kind of love I longed for, but had never experienced. I knew he had to be the Son of God.

I drew closer to the tree, pushing my way through the crowd. As I knelt beneath the tree, I cried because of his suffering. I knew it was all for me. He was on that tree because of my sins. As streams of tears fell from my eyes, I looked up to him and cried, "Lord!" As I did, a drop of blood from his broken body hit my sweaty, dirty forehead. He knew I believed.

Suddenly, I was aware of my mother tapping me on the shoulder. "Leah, it's time to go to school. Stop staring out the window!"

At that moment I realized that my daydream was not just a dream. For the first time, I understood that he died for me and rose from the dead so that my sins could be forgiven. Tears rolled down my cheeks as I again looked out the window. He loves me!

"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life." John 3:16

"This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations.” Luke 24:46-47

"If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved" Romans 10:9