Robbed

He phoned to offer me some consolation.

Word had gotten around that when we were setting up for the month’s youth fellowship night that we discovered some items missing. Our video game system had attached to sticky fingers and gone out the door of the church.

Again.

It’s frustrating when things are stolen, especially when you’re counting on using them. Not having the money to replace them makes it even worse.

So it was kind of him to call and I appreciated it.

In the conversation he was much more upset about things than I was. It wasn’t so much that he was stuck on the fact that the thing went missing. He just couldn’t get past that someone stole something from a church.

Getting worn down in his despair, I finally said, “You know, if things don’t get stolen from the church once in a while then were probably not working too hard at reaching the people who need to be here the most.”

Because, oddly enough, there was real victory in the robbery. It wasn’t a case of breaking and entering. Rather, someone who didn’t know how to operate under the most basic of Christian principles and ethics had actually been to church! The game’s absence proved it.

I’m not saying we should be foolish by leaving the doors unlocked or not follow appropriate safety and security measures. Rather, we need to be able to see through the pain and frustration of the crime and see it as a sign that we might just be doing something right.

Really, this shouldn’t be too foreign of a concept for us. After all, we have giant cross on the wall.

God, in all things we give you the glory!