Let’s just say that when I crawled out of bed the other morning, dreading a stressful day, calling 911 wasn’t even a blip on my radar.
But calling 911 turned out to be one of the highlights of my day. As my daughter said after I hung up, “Mom, you really called 911? This is so exciting!” She was positively giddy when she learned that they were on their way, and I have to admit, it was an adrenaline high for this adventure girl, too. The policeman’s grin throughout the process made it clear that we were the highlight of his day, as well.
We had heard that someone broke into our summer cottage earlier in the week, so we stopped by to check it out. Since no damage was done earlier, I wasn’t too concerned, other than to make sure the place was locked up so it wouldn’t happen again. As soon as we pulled up, we saw that the door curtains were missing. We followed the trail of evidence to the front door, where the coffee table was wedged against the double doors to hold them shut, and noticed that the doors weren’t locked. Obviously, he’d been back since earlier in the week. The bags of food on the floor and the cigarettes spread all over the place were a dead giveaway.
We moved the coffee table back, and noticed torn screens on the front porch, and the glass of the storm door was down. After sliding the storm door glass up, I turned around and noticed a black fabric bag leaning against one of the inside doors. Since the texture was rough, I knew it couldn’t hold fingerprints, so I opened it gingerly and peeked inside to see a half dozen more cigarette packs and a cell phone.
That was enough evidence for me; it was time to get the police in on this. I hoped the cell phone would be enough. I’ve been in a friend’s house that was fingerprinted and it took us both hours to clean. I didn’t ever want to repeat that.
Several hours later, the end result was that the policeman found a medicine container in the bag with the perp’s name on it. Turns out he’s a drug addict whose family dropped him off on the grounds knowing there were empty cottages where he could hide out, because they were sick of him.
While we waited for forensics, we got an education on which surfaces show fingerprints and which don’t. That’s when the title statement came in to play, “We’re not NCIS, Ma’am. We all love Abby, but she’s not dealing in the real world. Forensics isn’t that good.”
The thought crossed my mind that in so many cases, only God knows “who done it.”
Ironic thought. The perps know “who done it,” and they’re hiding out, hoping no one finds out, always on their guard, waiting for the day when a cop shows up on their doorstep.
How many of us have a perp mentality when it comes to God? There’s something in our life we’re ashamed of, and we’re on guard, waiting for the “gotcha” that we know we deserve, even though we know in our heads that he promised forgiveness.
Isn’t it time we stopped hiding out, stopped letting our shortcomings and sins alienate us from church, friends, and family–and simply confess? After all, only God knows. Only he has the answer, and only he can promise healing.