The tattoo artist on the airplane opened my eyes to how God works
By Dean Collins
I’m guessing you’d agree with me that middle seats on an airplane are an invention of either the devil or a highly extroverted entrepreneur who likes to talk to two people at once! Or the airlines’ greed got the best of them when they added one more seat where there was already not enough space for two average humans! I do my best to avoid being in the middle seat, but like you, I have no control over who is in the middle seat next to me. If I must sit next to someone on a plane, I hope they are small, introverted, asleep, and have a headset on so I can remain in my preferred mode of doing my own thing.
When I spotted my seat one day, I quickly realized most of my wishes would not be true. The guy in the middle did have a headset on, so there was hope. The problem both of us had, though, was that my traveling partner for the next hour and a half was the size of a starting center in the NFL. He was clearly uncomfortable, and we were both hopeful that the empty window seat beside him would offer us the chance to spread out. That hope was quickly dashed.
Judging by appearances
I should have been grateful just to be on the plane since I nearly missed the flight. Instead, my gratitude to God for answering my prayer that I make the flight sadly turned to selfish and judgmental thoughts as I approached my seat.
As much as we all try not to prejudge someone based on their appearance, sometimes our old sin nature gets the best of us. I don’t know if my seatmate judged me as an old white guy who has never seen struggle. I did not have any negative thoughts about him as I noticed his multiple, body-covering tattoos spreading beneath his gym shorts and out of his tank top. And with everyone in masks, you can’t really read a person’s face. But he did seem like a guy capable of throwing me from one end of the plane to the other if I crossed him.
Deciding to engage
He asked the first question. I had made a rookie mistake for a veteran introverted traveler. My Point University logo shirt and face prompted the inquiry. “So are you a professor?”
I gave an honest answer, “No.” He kept probing till I had to tell him I was the president. He seemed impressed. Feeling guilty for not being friendly, I asked, “So what do you do?” He responded that he was a truck driver. I thanked him for helping solve our supply chain challenges. Somewhere in the first few minutes I repented of not being friendly and decided to engage with my new friend.
I told him I didn't have any tattoos but my adult children did have a few. Don’t laugh, I was just trying to make conversation and relate. I continued: “I know people sometimes get tattoos to remember certain events or people in their lives. When did you get your first tattoo?”
In prison. His humble honesty brought silence for a moment. Would we be willing to be that transparent about some mistakes we’ve made in the past?
Hearing his story
Over the next several minutes he opened up about his past mistakes and how he had learned to be a tattoo artist in prison. I looked on his phone at multiple pictures of his many drawings. He is a good artist. I was fascinated by his ingenuity and survival skills while serving his 20-year sentence. He was 48, still a young man, and has watched God bring forgiveness and restoration to many areas of his life.
He told me the story of his conversion. While having to live away from the general population in prison, his only option to get his freedom back involved completing a class that dealt, among other issues, with surrendering gang membership. Alone in his cell, he told God he would never follow him. He heard God respond to him with a challenge to his stubborn heart.
It was then he told me about a prison chaplain who never gave up on him. No matter how many times he resisted and refused compliance, this chaplain kept showing up, trying to help him. God broke through, and my new friend surrendered to Jesus. He told me he could never go back to his old life because he’s a changed man.
Seeing his heart
I saw the evidence of his changed heart. I watched him joyfully show me pictures of his family and his art. At his insistence, I put on his headset to listen to him play a song on the guitar. He is into gospel music and country music. I saw him text loving updates to his wife to make sure she knew he was okay during his travels.
My friend was headed to Grand Rapids, Michigan where he was restarting a job with a trucking company. He would stay for a few days of training and drive the truck back to Texas where he would have a route that allowed him to be at home every evening. For him, this was critical in order to spend time with his wife, his adult daughter, and his two young grandchildren.
The more we talked, the more we realized we had several common interests. We both play the guitar. We both enjoy art. We are both committed to our marriages and our families. But most importantly, we both have been transformed by the power of the gospel.
Discovering God’s reality
I couldn’t help think about my traveling partner today as I read Romans 12. Our common experience of the mercies of God created a bond. I may not see my friend again this side of Heaven, but we might play a song together in a Heavenly praise band one day. Until then I will continue to offer myself to God as a living sacrifice and allow his Word to transform and renew my mind. Today my mind needed to be renewed so that I might meet a brother in Christ and a coworker in the gospel.
What would happen if we were more willing to engage in conversation with strangers? I suspect we would learn that in those conversations God might speak to us. Sometimes we think we are the only ones with the answer or the ability to encourage or help another. Sometimes God places strangers in front of us to minister to us, even though we think we have nothing in common with them. It is in these exchanges that we discover the bigger reality of how God is renewing and transforming lives everywhere.
Paul ends this passage reminding us not to think more highly of ourselves than we should and explaining that each of us has unique gifts that are to be used for God’s glory and for the building up of his body. I am thankful that on this trip it was the gift of a tattoo artist that brought encouragement to me. I pray my stories encouraged him as well. And hopefully, you, too, have been blessed by our conversation.
God has a way of getting lots of mileage out of his children when they are willing to open up and offer love and encouragement to each other.
Your time with God’s Word
Romans 12:1-8 ESV
Photos by Suhyeon Choi and Jamakassi on Unsplash
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