“Mystery Science Theater” by Kara Liggett

December 18

 Ephesians 6:10-18

Who doesn’t love a good mystery?  I know I do!  I loved Encyclopedia Brown stories as a child- he was so clever and he had a photographic memory that served him well in solving all sorts of problems that plagued his neighbor friends.  Sometimes Encyclopedia Brown would have to question several different witnesses to certain “crimes” in order to put together enough clues to find the answer to the riddle. 

I used to snoop around my neighborhood wearing what I thought were innocuous clothing choices.  I would record notes in my journals if I had a strange conversation; in my “spy trained” eyes, everything was suspicious and everyone was a suspect to a possible crime.  I would dust my invisible-to-the-naked-eye spy powder on things in my room to see if anyone messed with my stuff (no one ever did, much to my dismay). 

I was always looking for a crime to solve, a way to use all my useful notes of strange human behavior.  Maybe, inherently, we never lose these powers of observation- looking for more than what’s at the surface. 

One mystery that stumps a lot of us is how to live a Christian life in a broken world.  We are constantly battling spiritual warfare in our fleshly lives.  We want to do good but we do bad.  We want to live for God, but the world beckons so tantalizing in its promises.  We have to remember that like the best prepared spy- God has supplied us with a set of goodies in order to arm ourselves against the Devil (the Ultimate Enemy!).  God gave us tools that we must USE to fight Satan’s schemes.  He gave us RIGHTEOUSNESS, TRUTH, HIS SPIRIT, THE WORD, and most importantly, we have HIS POWER in our feet to run and spread the GOSPEL. 

The mystery is already solved, the battle is pre-ordained-  Christians win, mystery solved.  We just have to wake up every morning, armed with all our tools from God to start making our way through the darkness.  We are armed to the teeth with the Spirit of God, it’s our goal to use the full arsenal every day.  It still never hurts to sprinkle a little spy dust now and then...