It was the strangest and most thrilling case he had ever had. He was a detective, a private investigator. Clients hired him to find out things for them, to solve mysteries. This case, however was a mystery that he could not solve. Even though there were a lot of clues, he couldn’t figure out the answer. It was a mystery that was finally shown to him. He just had to pay attention to the right sources.
The case was brought to him by a group of clients – angels. Not little fat Valentine cherubs. Big, powerful, authoritative, intimidating. Real angels. He was certainly surprised when they showed up in his office. He always thought angels knew it all, or at least could ask their Boss. They admitted that they knew a lot, but not everything. Even more amazing – this case was something God wasn’t going to tell them outright. They had to get it from humans. So, they hired the detective.
The case centered on three people – very different people – a woman, a teenager, and a man. Different ages, different races, different backgrounds, different lifestyles. Same problem. The detective took the case, and his first move was to investigate each of the three subjects.
He found out quite soon that the woman was a very religious person. She seemed to know a lot of God-stuff. Commandments, laws, rules – she knew them all and obeyed them all. She did a lot of religious activity. She had been sprinkled when she was a baby, and then she got herself immersed – dunked – just to make sure. She went to church all the time – meetings every week, sometimes almost every day of the week. She prayed a lot, even in restaurants. She tuned in to every TV and radio program and every website that claimed to have the real explanations of God and life. The woman didn’t just read the Bible; she memorized it – single verses and long passages, even the genealogies and some of the study notes! Doctrines, teachings, principles, prophecies – she had it all worked out and was very satisfied with it. She was right and she knew it and she could prove it. She seemed to have this God-stuff all boxed and wrapped in a neat little package, so she lived by well-used clichés and inspirational sayings. After investigating her for awhile, the detective noticed something pretty startling – whenever God tried to get close to her, the woman got religious and moved away. She acted like she knew all about God, but she didn’t even know he was there.
The investigator checked out the teenager next. That was fun. Fun was what her life was all about! She was a nice kid – not a goody-good dork, but a likeable person. She had a lot of friends and they stayed in close contact and did a lot of things together. She accepted just about everyone, as long as they didn’t try to push her. She believed that everyone has the right to live the way he wants as long as he doesn’t try to force it on anyone else. Everybody’s values can contribute to the great circle of life – take what you like, what works for you, and have fun with it. She definitely believed in God – thought he was a great guy! Sometimes something serious would come up, and she would think about it and talk to her friends about it, then ask God to bless it and make it all work out for her – yeah, he was a great guy! It didn’t take long for the detective to see that whenever God tried to get close to the teenager, she would run off to find something fun to do.
Then there was the third person, the man. The detective did not enjoy investigating him at all. He was absolutely raunchy. He was violent – anyone who crossed him was in danger of serious harm – physical, emotional, whatever it took for him to do them in. He controlled and used people by running over them, by abusing them. He was very intelligent. His mind was like a cold steel trap. He knew how to bait people – how to make it look like he was on their side – how to manipulate and destroy them – for his own benefit. Most, actually all, of the people in his life suffered because of him. He was hedonistic to the core – whatever gave him physical or emotional or mental pleasure was his game. No restraints, no limitations – get all you can out of life. This man didn’t know if there is a God or not. In fact, he didn’t care. He was going to live his own way anyway. Everyone else be damned. The detective wasn’t too surprised to see that when God tried to get close to him, the man felt threatened and pushed God away.
The investigation went on long enough that the detective witnessed the three people crossing each others’ paths. From time to time, they happened to meet. But they wouldn’t have anything to do with each other. Each one distrusted, despised, and condemned the other two.
The angels who hired the detective knew all of this. They wanted to know something else. And here’s where the investigation ran into a brick wall. The angels wanted to know: what was God going to do with those three people? How was he going to get close to each one? How was he going to manage to bring them to himself? If he accepted religiousness, the woman would be okay, but the teenager and the man would be left out. If God just acted like a great guy and made everything easy and fun, the teenager would find him, but not the man or the woman. And if the Lord rewarded self-reliance and take-what-you-want aggressiveness, the man would come out the winner, but the woman and teenager would be losers. In fact, if God accepted any of the three the way they were, he would be contradicting his own nature of justice and holiness.
What was God going to do with them?
To be continued…