When I was a young
cop, I was working the midnight shift as a rookie. My training officer and I received a call to
respond to a domestic dispute. These calls
carry the potential for violence because people release a lifetime of pain in a
single, unscripted moment and many times the responding police officers are the
first to encounter these raw emotions.
On this particular
call we arrived at a house that was dark and quiet. All my internal alarms went on high
alert. Nothing felt right. In that moment, I had a strong impression to
walk around the entire house before I answered the front door. I am glad I followed my instinct. As my flashlight beam surveyed the interior
of the living room, I saw a shotgun set up on a table pointing at the front
door with an elaborate string system in place that was attached to the doorknob. Once the front door opened the string would
have pulled the trigger and sent me into eternity.
Over the years, I
have faced similar booby traps hundreds of times. These traps were not set up with
shotguns aimed to kill me. They were traps set to destroy me spiritually – the
worse kind of death. I have discovered
that each of these spiritual traps fire when the trigger of pride is
pulled.
After many years of
walking with God, I have come to realize we need to do a walk around for each
challenging situation we face to make sure that a booby trap of pride is not set
waiting for us to open the door to its death and destruction. The pause that
takes place in this walk around can save your life.
On the night of
that domestic violence call, I eventually crawled through the window and
disabled the booby trap. I then opened the front door for my partner to enter
the house. It is a wonderful feeling
knowing that a booby trap has been disabled and no longer has the power to
bring harm.
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