I love me some Columbo.
I think he’s one of the best fictional detectives ever. So there’s this episode that features a professor getting killed remotely by two of his students and the two students look to be as ‘helpful’ as they can in the investigation with the Lieutenant. It’s fair to say they look to lead our hero on a merry goose chase from one blind alley to another. What they, as others, fail to appreciate about Columbo is that when he has the scent, the worse thing you can do is to be ‘helpful’. He will stick to the scent and the more the effort to distract, the clearer it becomes to him that the scent is strong.
Today, we are given a whiff of heaven in the life and times of Jesus Christ. It is a beautiful smell – it’s the smell of life. There’s enough in the smell to invite you to follow the scent home. There’s enough distinct about the smell to lift all the other senses to know there is something better ahead that can be experienced in a small sense in the now.
The challenge is to stay on the scent. It’s an ever increasing challenge because there are perpetrators who are doing all they can to take you off the scent. That’s why so much of the life of following Jesus is about being encouraged to develop and seek after the scent. Stay on it. Search for it diligently. Encourage others to do so likewise.
Recognising the efforts to put you off the scent should be the signal to be devoted to it all the more. It’s a clear sign that you’re onto something very good if you see efforts to put you off. Seeing this should remind you of what was so beautiful about the scent in the first place.
You don’t even have to like Columbo to get in on the scent! (It doesn’t hurt though.)
(Photo by Danielle Marroquin on Unsplash)
For His Name’s Sake
Shalom
C. L. J. Dryden
Life With CD 